[ingi]

Hi all.
New to DSLR and Pentax, hence the inquiry. At the moment my local camera shop has a great deal on a K20D kit package ($1500 aussie) After alot of reading on this forum and others (very bleary eyed at the moment). I have narrowed down my choice in lenses. I am hoping that I have covered most of my bases with this selection.

I shoot mainly landscapes at low light (dusk and dawn). Love macro. Portraits of kids and babies. (for friends and family) Kids sports indoors and of course family snapshots.

Lens list.
17-70 sigma
55-300 DA Pentax
and possibly the Tamaron 28-250. (for the times I dont want to change lenses for everyday use)

Or should I forgo the 55-300 and just stick to the 28-250.

I guess I am asking for confirmation that the above lenses are appropriate for the type of images I like taking and fast enough for use indoors with low light and kids that can't sit still for too long.

The shop I am purchasing from is willing to swap the Kit lens deal (18-55 not a vs II) with the sigma, so I have enough funds to purchase an extra lens.

Thanks in advance

[clawhammer]

Welcome to the forum!

I would stick with the 17-70 and 55-300- at the longer lengths you'll appreciate the extra half stop of light from the 55-300, and I am willing to bet that the 55-300 would out-perform the 18-250 @250 any day of the week (and twice on thursday).

Further along the line you may also consider a wide-angle, like the sigma 10-20 or pentax DA12-24 or DA14 for the landscapes.

[xxxxx]

Hi all.
New to DSLR and Pentax, hence the inquiry. At the moment my local camera shop has a great deal on a K20D kit package ($1500 aussie) After alot of reading on this forum and others (very bleary eyed at the moment). I have narrowed down my choice in lenses. I am hoping that I have covered most of my bases with this selection.

I shoot mainly landscapes at low light (dusk and dawn). Love macro. Portraits of kids and babies. (for friends and family) Kids sports indoors and of course family snapshots.

Lens list.
17-70 sigma
55-300 DA Pentax
and possibly the Tamaron 28-250. (for the times I dont want to change lenses for everyday use)

Or should I forgo the 55-300 and just stick to the 28-250.

I guess I am asking for confirmation that the above lenses are appropriate for the type of images I like taking and fast enough for use indoors with low light and kids that can't sit still for too long.

The shop I am purchasing from is willing to swap the Kit lens deal (18-55 not a vs II) with the sigma, so I have enough funds to purchase an extra lens.

Thanks in advance

I'm a Canon user moving to Pentax. From my limited research, I think I'd go with the 16-45mm F4 and the 31mm F1.8 limited for now. Not sure about longer end yet.

[bigben91682]

welcome to the forum, both of you!

I second the 16-45 as a very fine wide zoom, I like mine a lot. I've never used the 17-70 but have heard nothing but good things. Depending on your shooting style and needs, I would consider the FA 50 1.4. IMHO best lense for the money. Low light dynamo, smooth bokeh, very sharp. Yeah the 31ltd is probably sharper, but it's 3x the price.

Welcome to Pentax, as a canon convert myself, you shant be dissapointed!

[ingi]

Thanks for your quick responses. Just looking around at some prices here in Aussie and nobody has the 55-300 pentax even listed. I assume this is a newer lens? Not even the Aussie Pentax site has this lens listed. There doesn't seem to be alot of available choices of pentax lenses around here. Shame really.
Thankyou for the suggestion of the 50mm. I hadn't considered it because I didn't know if it would be versatile enough for anything other than inside portrait. I am coming from a canon S3IS and am used to having a big zoom range available at the touch of finger. It will take a little re-learning to plan my shots I think.

[xxxxx]

welcome to the forum, both of you!

I second the 16-45 as a very fine wide zoom, I like mine a lot. I've never used the 17-70 but have heard nothing but good things. Depending on your shooting style and needs, I would consider the FA 50 1.4. IMHO best lense for the money. Low light dynamo, smooth bokeh, very sharp. Yeah the 31ltd is probably sharper, but it's 3x the price.

Welcome to Pentax, as a canon convert myself, you shant be dissapointed!

Thanks bigben. Yep, the 50 1.4 is definitely interesting. My only concern is it's a bit too long for indoor portray. My house's small.

A question on raw format, I use lightroom. To get K20D raw processed, I'd better store in the DNG format?

[cputeq]

To be safe, yeah, use DNG, but I think Lightroom is pretty good at supporting custom RAW formats also.

I'll do a quick check here after I eat my homemade pizza

[Zewrak]

Sigma 18-50 EX DC MACRO + Pentax DA 50-200 is a good starter kit imho. But to be honest, if your new to it, get the 18-55 + 50-200 kit. It should be cheap. Shoot for a few months and you will see what you miss. None of them are bad lenses, no matter what people tell you. The 50-200 is insanely good per $.

Buying expensive lenses before you know what you shoot and how to use the camera is a mistake. I did that, I spent alot on the Sigma 18-50 (well not alot, but half the house price) because people kept telling me kit lenses suck.

Now, I never use my Sigma, not because its a bad lens, but I rarely have any use for 18-50. Had I stuck to the kit lens from start, id known that and saved a bundle for lenses I would use.

EDIT: Reread your post. Get the sigma instead of the kit and the 50-200
EDIT2: And when your done evaluating your shots, get the Super takumar 150mm and the Super takumar 200mm and never look back

[Ash]

Australia's a little slow to get on the bandwagon with most photo gear. Don't be too disappointed - it's the norm for most of the good Pentax gear to be either unavailable or grossly overpriced. This is why many Aussies have resorted to buying gear from US online vendors like B&H or Adorama.

On your choices, I'd second either DA 16-45 or Sigma 17-70 plus the DA 55-300. I wouldn't go with the DA 50-200 as it has had only mediocre reviews compared with the 55-300, which people are much more satisfied with. You might do well to order your K20D + wide angle lens locally, and spend the extra cash on the 55-300 coming from the US, which will come within 3 working days (!) and be significantly cheaper - not to mention that it's available now!

I'd also second getting a wider angle zoom like the Sigma 10-20 or Pentax 12-24, depending on how much wide angle you're after. Hope this helps.

[roentarre]

I think you got good choices. Sigma 17-70 will be the most used lens while Da 55-300 will fill in the gap occasionally for some bird shots etc.

Macro is not a must. However, every photographer at one stage will lust for a macro at one stage, going through phases like filter, exntention tube and then finally macro lens, ending up selling the macro since it i will be sitting on the shelf for quite some time...

[squarerigger]

I'm a Canon user moving to Pentax. From my limited research, I think I'd go with the 16-45mm F4 and the 31mm F1.8 limited for now. Not sure about longer end yet.

Welcome to the forum -- always good to have someone with excellent tastes. I too desire the FA31MM!!!!

Gary

[Dale]

G'day,

I have a Sigma 17-70 on my K10. It is the lens that as James (roentarre) suggests is the one that stays on my camera. I swap it out for a Tamron 70-300mm when the need for reach or macro gets me. (Mind you, the reports of the DA 55-300 are very good.)

If your shop is willing to swap a kit 18-55mm non II lens at no cost, you have a good deal. Teds camera in Melbourne had the Sigma on sale at $299, which was a real bargain.

Check the threads on the forums for advantages/disadvantages in buying from the States when it comes to purchases under $1000 (customs GST trigger) You can get a Pentax international warranty on any Pentax product purchased from the States. pm me for details if you are thinking of an O/S purchase.

Do post your images here, your flickr gallery is impressive.

Welcome to the forums

Dale

[AML]

Thanks for your quick responses. Just looking around at some prices here in Aussie and nobody has the 55-300 pentax even listed. I assume this is a newer lens? Not even the Aussie Pentax site has this lens listed. There doesn't seem to be alot of available choices of pentax lenses around here. Shame really.
Thankyou for the suggestion of the 50mm. I hadn't considered it because I didn't know if it would be versatile enough for anything other than inside portrait. I am coming from a canon S3IS and am used to having a big zoom range available at the touch of finger. It will take a little re-learning to plan my shots I think.

ingi, C.R. Kennedy does have the DA 55-300mm in stock. You would need to get your store to order it in. It comes at a high aussie price though, $650 -$699.

I ended up pre-ordering mine from Adorama for US$349 + $47 UPS shipping. With the strong aussie $$ at the moment that works out to about $420 shipped.
There's one small hitch, it's back ordered at Adorama so you will have a wait. ( don't know how long for).

[ingi]

Thanks to everyone for responding.
I will be sticking with the sigma 17-70. I can't believe the price differences from US to AUS. I will be doing some serious bargaining with my local shop. I would prefer to buy local for convenience of returns, if there are any defects etc.

Dale, thanks for looking at my pics.

AML, I did have a look at Adorama and saw that it was on back order. Just my luck. I finally convince hubby that I really do need an upgrade in camera and I go to press the button and my choice of lens ...... not available.

I am travelling to Tasmania in 2 weeks and really wanted to take the new kit with me.

Ash, thanks for the suggestion of sigma 10-20. I will have a look at some of my landscape pics and see what length I used to see if I need to go wider.

[konraDarnok]

18-250mm, I took this today. I'd say this is about as sharp as this lens gets. FYI. . . since you were considering this lens. The bottom right is a full pixel crop of the whole frame seen in this picture. Not bad eh? It's slow tho. There's no substitute for speed.

No post processing. (other than the crop overlay of course)