Veteran Member Original Poster |
Thank you everyone for your replies. It's right, I should go into details.
The lenses I use the most :
- Sigma 10-20 F3.5 (for landscape and astro, but I have to admit a 2x zoom often seems limitating)
- Pentax DA 35 F2.4 (for general use)
- Pentax HD DA 55-300 PLM (for anything with a longer focal length)
The lenses with few use :
- Pentax SMC DA 10-17 Fisheye (I really like this lens but I lack time currently to play with it)
- Pentax DA 50 F1.8 (no many occasions to do portraits currently, and the focal length is a bit large when it comes to general use)
- Pentax DFA 50 Macro F2.8 (not enough skilled to get good macro shot yet, and working distance is so small that I have to use external lights to avoid overshadowing the subject, which is awkward to use)
The lenses I almost never use :
- Tamron AF 18-250 (but it's good to have around to catch on event when I have no idea of the focal length I may need)
- Pentax DA-L 18-50 F4-5.6 (I don't like this lens much, but it's good to have it around if I ever need WR or silent focusing)
- Tamron AF 70-300 (it is a fun lens, but PLM made this one obsolete and is the only lens I would not mind getting rid of)
If I really had to sell a lens, the 70-300 would be a no-brainer. But I won't get much of it, so I wonder if it is really worth the time and effort?
When I look at my lenses, I see that when it comes to WR, I only have two suitable, the 18-50 and the PLM. But I have to admit that I don't need WR often.
All of my lenses are auto-focusing, most are screw-drive and very noisy (the Tamron 18-250 could be mistaken for a screw-driver). Only three of them are silent focusing : the Sigma 10-20, the 18-50 and the PLM.
When it comes to astro, I have no real "need", since I don't do deep sky, because of lack of equatorial mount and lack of GPS to make use of the KS-2 astrotracer. Looking at lenstip, Sigma 10-20 correct coma rather well at 20mm. I thought the Sigma 17-50 could help with that thanks to its F2.8 maximum aperture, but coma with that lens is rather horrible, according to lenstip. But thinking about it, buying a lens just for that rare use case would be a waste of money.
If I had to describe a need (putting LBA aside), I would say that I need a quality lens that could stay on my KS-2 most of the time, with great IQ, versatility, a fast lens to allow indoor-shooting without a flash, and silent-focusing. WR would be nice, but is not strictly needed. Silent-focusing and fast lens requirement are because I will soon have a newborn that will be a perfect subject for shots in low-light with no screw-drive noise allowed.
That's why I thought of the Sigma 17-50 F2.8, which seems to fit the bill, except for WR, and is only a 3x zoom. But since I don't do post-processing (because of lack of time mostly), I admit I am attracted by Pentax zoom because of those colors rendering, but they are all slow.
When it comes to Limited lenses, well, I don't really understand the fuss about them, but it's probably because I never got one! But except the 20-40, all are either slow (DA 15, DA 21), double with my own gear (DA 35 F2.8, DA 40), or with a too large focal length (DA 70), and except the 20-40 Limited, all are noisy and lack WR. The 20-40 Limited looks nice, but the review on Pentaxforums states that 40mm is subpar. It's only a 2x zoom, slow on the long end, and I feel it limiting (same for Sigma 10-20). Oddly enough, a prime is less limiting to my eyes because I know I have to walk to make my composition work!
A new body like the KP would give me one stop of light thanks to high ISO performance, but I would still lack of a lens that could stay on my body most of the time.
Help.
Last edited by Bertrand3000; 11-30-2020 at 06:44 AM.
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