Hey guys, just found this link and thought it might be an interesting for some of you:
Zeiss Milvus Distagon T* 18mm f/2.8 Review - DustinAbbott.net
It compares the Zeiss 18mm with the Tamron 15-30mm. It kinda drew my attention as I think Pentax lenses are designed or built by Tamron?? I maybe way off but the reason I came to that conclusion was a post I found in the DPR forums which claimed the Pentax 24-70mm to basically be a rebadged Tamron with the stability VR motors disabled and different coating applied. Sure there's a lot of unproven information in that post and something that I won't get into here because I'm not really interested in the small details, what I am interested in is overall IQ under specific conditions.
From the Dustin Abbot link posted above, it looks like the Tamron 15-30 IQ is actually better then the Zeiss, meaning that if the DFA15-30 features the same or similar optical formula should be equally as good or better. I can tell directly from the images and user reviews though that the DFA15-30 is a pretty high performance beast!
Here, I also want to ask if anyone has had experience of buying lenses off Ebay?
Lot's of research into the seller that I contacted, showed that it was an American owned company but sourcing the parts from Japan, which seems to be common as there seem to also be lots of Australian owned stores like this too ("we send using Australia Post"). Another strange thing is that there are lots of unrelated items on the store like shades and Japanese toys etc... my guess is that it's not a specific camera shop but a used parts store of anything and everything.
For me the warning flags are flying!!
I did however, find a Tokina 12-28mm lens for Nikon F mount locally for cheaper plus less postage from an actual camera store. I contacted them to see if they could help with the other items on my list. Hopefully I'll get a response soon.
What's a little distressing currently causing lots of anxiety and headache for me is the Tokina 28-70mm f/2.8 for the Pentax K mount. It seems like an extremely rare lens and outside of these non-camera specific used stuff stores can't find any copies anywhere. It doesn't have to be this lens, it could be any other aggressively sharp lens of the same zoom capability but unfortunately, outside of the Pentax own 24-70mm there don't seem to be other things available
In fact I went as far as to even check out the Nikon F to K mount adapters to see if I could buy a Nikon version from Tamron or Sigma and use it on the K1 with mount converter. After reading a couple of posts from here and DPR, it looks like that only works with Nikon gen 1 lenses with no information given to the camera at all. It looks like even my 1977-82 based 50mm won't work in this context either because of the TTL ring.
Otherwise it could have been an option to use a converter with this guy:
https://tokinalens.com/product/atx_i_17_35mm_f4_ff/#specifications
but no manual aperture ring would present another problem
Looks like there's also a Sigma 24-70mm f/2.8 ART lens too, but again it would be locked to CaNikon.
This is a miserable situation to be in for me
because it means that if I can't find a decent lens to cover my needs from 24/28mm+, then either am gona have to go with a whole bunch of primes loosing the versatility (and space saving) of the zoom or I would have to ditch the K1 above 30mm
I think I have made the decision to go for the 15-30mm from what I can see, so my only other option would be a 45mm Irix (which might be tricky as it's a little narrower), or use the D500 for focal lengths above 30mm which means that I loose sensor reproduction and IQ that the K1 has.
The Tokina 17-35mm would give me 26mm to 52mm on the D500. For landscape I wouldn't really need to go beyond 50mm I think as we start getting into walkabout travel, portrait and uncharted territory for me.
Maybe that's the best I can do for now??
Darn why does having to plan a simple trip have to be so complicated and stressful...
but then again it isn't about the trip, it's about the camera and the equipment needed to get the images that I want. It's more of a photographic journey then trip in that context!
The things I will enjoy though will be driving long distances and stopping at rest/service stations in the middle of nowhere during the dark hours of night. I really love that kind of thing!!