[mee]

Another vote for the DA 50mm f/1.8

50mm on your Pentax SLR (crop) is equivalent to 75mm on a 'Full Frame' (35mm film) camera

f/1.8 aperture will give you tons of pleasing bokeh and stopped down to around 5.6 or 8 will give you really sharp images. Plus the lens is pretty small (portable). Physical sizing and weight of the DA prime lenses is something I'm growing to appreciate.

Plus this little 50mm f/1.8 was nears the tops in a shootout of various manufacturer nifty 50's (you had to spend A LOT more to surpass it) on popphoto or another photog site (Can't remember exactly)

If you want to spend money, a lot of wedding/portrait photogs tend to go with 70-200mm (Pentax makes a 50-135 equiv) zooms for the convenience of range on the fly (but I think most of their shots are on the wider end of that lens - hence the 50mm f/1.8 makes sense)

btw most of your shots do look a bit soft.. almost as if the lens is back-focusing; I can't seem to see on what you were focusing. Oh, and I noticed quite a bit of them are really very underexposed too. I'd still get the 50mm and when focusing, focus on the eyes. I'd get the 35mm f/2.4 if you have any money left over.

[JimJohnson]

+2 on the F 35-70. It is sometimes described as a 'bag full of primes'. I view it as the sleeper lens in the Pentax line up because it sells for so little.

If you are comfortable with always manually focusing, sure the KA 50mm f/1.7 is a great option. But with kids, the F 35-70 does fast auto focus which allows you to follow kids and wait for the perfect, but fleeting, moment.

[mee]

Pentax SMCP-DA 50mm f/1.8 Standard Lens 22177

They also have the 35mm f/2.4 for the same price.. so around $333 for both lenses total. Doesn't get cheaper (brand new) than that!

[smileyz1gin]

I was able to get the a 50mm 1.7 for 35 $ on Ebay so i'm going to see if I can manage with that wine the cost was so little I figure if its too hard to manually focus I'll just resell and go for the da 50 1.8. I'm kind of thinking of getting a used 35 mm as well as I cab get that one for cheap too, what do you shoot mostly with the 35mm?

[JimJohnson]

I was able to get the a 50mm 1.7 for 35 $ on Ebay

Is that the M-series or A-series lens? With A-series the only thing you don't get is automated focus. With the M-series you have to do stop-down metering in addition to manual focus. Not like it is difficult, but it is one more thing to manage while trying to keep up with busy children.

[Parallax]

Closed due to multiple threads on the same subject.

Please continue the discussion here