[rormeister]

Here you go .....

Pentax DA 18-250mm f/3.5 - 6.3 Photo Gallery by alfisti at pbase.com

Wonderful series! This is precisely why I purchased this lens, and based on your results I hopefully will capture my next European adventure with it. For me, I've been extremely pleased, and with a monopod it is a very versatile lens.

[laissezfaire]

Thanks everyone for the responses... it sounds like waiting a couple of months won't hurt (it's winter now anyway) since it's mostly an outdoor lens.

PentaxPoke, your test series did it for me... I also have the DA* 50-135 and have conducted similar tests with the 18-55 kit lens but never got anywhere near as close to the same quality. So that indeed confirms that this is much better than the kit lens.

Finally, I would like to note that the other thing that PentaxPoke test show is just how GOOD the K10D is compared to the K20D. While I never owned that body, I'm impressed!

[Class A]

You own this lens?

If not, I've been using someone else's the last 5 months.

This is exactly what I do to get tack sharp pictures at wide angle focal lengths.

Hmmh, perhaps the pictures could be even better focused?

I've tried this a while ago and clearly noticed that focus had to be adjusted after changing the focal length.

Just to make sure, I just did a test.

1. zoom in to 250, AF
2. set to MF, zoom out to 18mm, take a picture
3. leave at 18mm, AF, take another picture

I did this with a tripod and 2sec delay.

Clearly, AF readjusts at the wide setting (or at the long setting, depending which way round you do it). The second image was always a bit sharper.
The only time it wasn't sharper was when I dialed in an incorrect AF focus adjustment.

EDIT: I just redid the test for different apertures and made an interesting discovery.