just a year ago i was using my crappy (but has sentimental value) 3MP Sony P&S which never went past ISO 100. i recently went to Scotland and London with my K100D and chose to bring the DA21, FA43 and FA77. This probably mirrors most "Limited" travel kits which are anchored by the DA21 and a *A7* lens.
some stuff i've learned about the lenses:
-FA43 is a great walkaround lens - landscapes, people, street-style w/ extra reach, food, overall very versatile
-FA43 is an awesome museum lens. the circular hood makes it easy to block out glare shooting through museum glass
-not afraid to shoot wide open on the FA43 or the FA77
FA43 1.9
FA77 1.8
-FA43's hood is not sufficient
-FA43 does have some focus some sporadic focus problems in museums / churches. very difficult to pin down the cause, sometimes it would work fine then suddenly go out of whack. for example, the AF couldn't get the ceiling as sharp as when i MFd.
-FA77 does not do group photos - i had the FA77 on sometimes and my parents wanted a photo. what looked ok on the display did not look ok on the computer. the faces were too square due to perspective and need to stop down past f11 to get sharp backgrounds
-FA77 DOES do great landscapes - both the FA43 and FA77 have excellent infinity focus detail
some comments about shooting style:
-bring at least the number of rear end caps as the number of lenses, makes it easy to change lenses
-did not have a problem with changing lenses too often which was good, with primes i am starting to "see" exactly how much of what i'm looking at will show up in the picture. i had to use my dad's Pana TZ4 to take some photos and i had a horrendous time zooming in and out for composition.
-FA43 doesn't provide a thin enough dof for my taste but the FA77 definitely does and i should practice much more
-slr is a lot heavier than a p&s, but it's worth the struggle
-still need to adjust from the P&S massive DOF which would be handy to have in an SLR sometimes at more handholdable shutter speeds
-i almost didn't use the DA21 and almost none of the photos were keepers, not sure why - until i went to the autoshow. lucky i didn't leave that lens at home that day!
-i probably need a polarizer, but bumping up the saturation and contrast in PP does the trick
-as great as the FA43 next time i'm considering taking the 31 and 77 next time to save on bulk (and have the DA21 available) because the FA31 is better than both the DA21 and FA43 although quite a bit heavier
-at the end of the trip, the shocker was how much i loved using the FA77, quite a large portion of my photos came out of using the lens. using it to look for details is awesome. i'm starting to develop a philosophy that it is easy to find very excellent photos of entire objects / scenes so instead, it's more fun to be creative and look to highlight details.
please take a look at additional photos in the zenfolio link in my signature under travel
comments are very welcome
Last edited by k100d; 08-04-2008 at 08:12 PM.