Originally posted by Paul the Sunman The DA15 was probably my favourite lens on APS-C for years (on K5 and K3). Since I bought the K1 though, I haven't shot much with the smaller sensor, though I have on occasion used the DA15 in 1:1 mode on FF.
But today, inspired by all the excitement about the announcement of a new flagship APS-C camera from Pentax for 2020, I took the K3 out for a long walk along Southbank in Melbourne, with DA40, DA70, DA 55-300, DA 16-85, DA 10-17 fisheye, ... and of course the DA15 Limited.
I must say I was surprised when I processed the DA15 shots this evening. They were sharp at frame centre, but really very soft even halfway to the edges. I have become so used to the much more even edge-to-edge sharpness of the DFA 15-30 that the DA15 jarred somewhat. In reality, and I think I always knew this, the DA15 is best used for a close subject near frame centre and OOF background, for which it renders beautifully. It is less well-suited to broad landscape or group photos.
I have the full list that Paul went walking with, on a K-70 in my case. I find all of those lenses really good, but I would leave the DA15mm out of my top ten list as i do not use that focal length enough.
In my film days, my favorite prime lenses were a Tokina 17mm, Tamron 90mm and Pentax M 135mm, and these translate in terms of field of view to about 11mm, 60mm and 90mm on APS-C. I used mostly premium zooms (Tamron Adaptall SP mostly) and top grade slide film (fujichrome 50).
PRIMES
I went through my list of primes in response to this thread, and I listed just those that I have evidence for giving great images on my K-70.
HD DA Limited 21mm/f3.2
SMC DA Limited 40 mm/f2.8
FA 50mm/f1.4
SMC DA 70mm/f2.4
Tamron Adaptall 2 SP 90mm macro 52BB
Sigma EX DG macro 105mm/f2.8
Vivitar (Komine) 135mm/f2.8
M 200mm/f4
I can add two to make a list of ten but still the DA 15mm does not make it:
Vivitar (Cosina) 24mm/f2.8 in PK-A/R mount
SMC Pentax 55mm/f1.8 or A 50mm/f1.7
Only three on the near-miss list, two oldies and one fairly recent, which results in three out of 13 lenses being 50-55mm:
The other one of the 50/55mm primes from above list
Sigma EX 50mm/f2.8 macro
Tamron Adaptall 2 135mm/f2.5
EDIT - I forgot my Pentax M 28mm/f3.5, just because I do not use it very often on APS-C. It is a magic lens and well worth being on the list, maybe in place of the Cosina 24mm.
ZOOMS
For favourite high-performance zooms, Paul's three are a good start and I will add two that I think are better optically than the modern 16-85mm:
HD DA 16-85mm
HD DA 55-300mm
DA 10-17mm because I have only zooms to go ultrawide and this one fits in a pocket (the old Sigma 10-20mm/f4-5.6 is sharper but too clumsy to take out often)
Sigma EX DG 24-60mm
Pentax F 35-70mm
I have another really great performer the Tamron Adaptall 2 SP 60-300mm which is the sharpest tele zoom I have, but it loses out to the Pentax 55-300mm on size+weight.
Last edited by Gary H Perth; 09-22-2019 at 06:48 AM.