[lesmore49]

I have to agree with the poster that Pentax glass will cover 99 % of needs.

I have:

• 16-45 Zoom...love the wide angle for close up car shots, landscapes, buildings and group
• 55-300 Zoom- racked out to 300 mm I'm getting great wildlife shots...any lens bigger...I'm mnot sure I could hand hold well enough for the great shots I get now...my buddy has a 400 C....boy that's a beautiful lens, but also big and heavy. I like my 55-300 accurate, clear, sharp.
• 50 f1.4 what a great available light, indoor portrait lens
• 50mm Takumar Macro ...converts to about a 70-75 mm macro...lovely
• 35-105 Pentax A Macro Zoom...a beautiful lens...aabout 57 mm to 160 mm lens on my K10D- fills a lot of gaps

What more do you need unless your taking stadium shots and need a fast 400-500...I don't need...all my Pentax lens do it all for me.

[Mallee Boy]

I'm starting to feel the same as steve. I have been saving for a sigma 10-20mm lens for my K200d and being in Australia seems worse than Salt Lake City. Even australian online stores are pretty bad when it comes stocking pentax lenses. Some don't carry any yet have plenty of Nikon and Canon glass.
I've been looking at the Canon EOS 450d and now I'm debating whether I should spend my $$$ on a new Camera or my much wanted wide angle lens. As it stands I don't have much in the way of pentax lenses (DA 40mm is it) and a few sigmas so I haven't invested too much yet. I have no older pentax lenses from film days so that's not a reason for me to stick with pentax.
It's all too hard!!!

Hang in there Leanne,
I guess you know about Digital camera Ware House and Camera Action warehouse, if not, google them

They have generally got most bases covered at pretty competitive prices (worldwide).

Cheers
Grant

[Confused]

Ditto with jct us101 !

You'll never be happy with your camera, Canon designs it that way.

Canon's ergonomics suck BIG TIME. They really do, trust me ! If I ever decided to "abandon ship" so to speak, it would probably be in the direction of N***n's D700, but I'd undoubtedly find myself in the bankruptcy courts shortly afterwards. I mean, have you seen the exorbitant prices of their range of VR lenses.....ouch !! Pentax actually did most users an incredible favour by incorporating SR inside the DSLR body itself, rather than fleecing us in the manner that C***n and N***n regularly do each time somebody buys one of their new stabilised lenses ! In fact they must truly be laughing all the way to the bank every time a fresh sucker (sorry, I meant customer) buys into their respective systems !

Best regards
Richard

[pingflood]

I have to agree with the poster that Pentax glass will cover 99 % of needs.

I have:

• 16-45 Zoom...love the wide angle for close up car shots, landscapes, buildings and group
• 55-300 Zoom- racked out to 300 mm I'm getting great wildlife shots...any lens bigger...I'm mnot sure I could hand hold well enough for the great shots I get now...my buddy has a 400 C....boy that's a beautiful lens, but also big and heavy. I like my 55-300 accurate, clear, sharp.
• 50 f1.4 what a great available light, indoor portrait lens
• 50mm Takumar Macro ...converts to about a 70-75 mm macro...lovely
• 35-105 Pentax A Macro Zoom...a beautiful lens...aabout 57 mm to 160 mm lens on my K10D- fills a lot of gaps

What more do you need unless your taking stadium shots and need a fast 400-500...I don't need...all my Pentax lens do it all for me.

The 16-45 is probably one of the most underrated lenses in history. You can get them for just over $200 used and they are flat out fantastic. Yeah, there's some distortion on the wide end (only time I had problems with it was when I had some tall building near the edges and even PTlens couldn't fix it), but it's really sharp wide open and just puts out some great color.

[Bramela]

Leanneqld

I have been using Pentax for as long as I can remember. I currently have a K10d. I cannot recall the last time I went to a Photo store to buy anything Pentax.
DCW, B&H, even Ebay, to name a few, I have bought all my gear on line. No hassles and very pleased with the service, convenience, price etc etc. Absolutely no problems to date.
Check it out, I would suggest.

[mike.hiran]

Honestly, I really don't understand this issue. Every lens I've purchsed I never had held in my hands or seen on a store shelf. But then again, I've only looked in a single store at Pentax products... Really with reputable online retailers such as Amazon, B&H, Adorama etc with good customer service and lower prices, I don't see a compelling reason to pay considerably more just because they have a lens on their shelf. And it's not like a store has much to offer in terms of knowledge that can't be eclipsed by informed users on forums like this who have often used the lens and can compare it to others. Not only do online forums like this allow you to buy smarter, but you'll have a much greater selection to choose from given that online inventories are often much more comprehensive than what you'd ever find in a bricks and mortar store.

Now perhaps you have a phobia of buying things online... well then, either go on a vacation to a place that has a lot of pentax products or switch. But... where did you buy your camera?

[rfortson]

I live in Houston (4th largest city in the US) and I don't usually see much Pentax stuff on the shelves of the local camera stores. However, since I buy all my gear online, it doesn't matter to me at all. The few times I've seen Pentax gear in stores it was much more than online.

Right now, I've got 16mm to 200mm at 2.8 covered, 300mm at 4.0 and then the Bigma goes to 500mm (well, 700mm with the TC). Plus, I've got the 10-17mm fisheye, and I've got a very nice 50mm 1.4 lens, and a 90mm macro. This doesn't include my 18-250 "vacation" lens or my kit lens. I'm having a hard time justifying any more lenses. I guess if I hit the lottery I'd order up the 600/4 lens, and I'd buy the suite of FA/DA limited primes.

And a nice young man in a brown uniform will bring them all right to my doorstep.

I just don't get this "no Pentax lenses available". For me, the interweb will bring me all the goodies I can dream of.

If you get tired of Canon and decide to part with the 135/2 let me know.

Curious: what body do you use? You mentioned the 85/1.8 being nothing special, but it seems like it really shines on full frame. Friend has one on a 40D and his shots look good, but nothing outstanding; on my 1Ds II it is stunning though.

Wow I agree, my buddy just got the 85 1.8 for his canon and I loved how the shots looked from that lens. And it is purt-near half the price of the 77 ltd.
Interesting that canon can make a lens like that for that kind of money...

[jct us101]

You're also forgetting the Pentax FA 24-90, which in my opinion is one of the best walkaround ranges you can get. Great image quality for just over $300 is hard to get from CANIKON.

[Saaby]

Just be glad you were at Ritz because that is the only place in Salt Lake you are going to find any Pentax product, in my experience anyway.

Doesn't matter to me though, because, like many others have said here, I buy my stuff online anyway.

Anyway I'm not totally sure what your argument against Pentax is.

If you're complaining that there isn't as much glass available in stores...you're right, and with Ritz (Excuse me...Inkleys, the local name) closing up many of it's shops, you're about to find even fewer places (Brick and Mortar) to buy your glass.

Now, honestly, how many lenses are you going to buy from Inkleys in your lifetime? Maybe 4 or 5? Even if you catch the "Lens Buying Addiction" you're going to quickly outgrow the offerings at Inkleys, regardless of system.


Now, if you're saying that you think the family of lenses offered for the other systems is better...then you can go ahead and refer back to what people are saying in here. There's nearly almost any lens you could want for Pentax (But you're probably going to have to order over the internet. See point 1).

[leanneqld]

Hang in there Leanne,
I guess you know about Digital camera Ware House and Camera Action warehouse, if not, google them

They have generally got most bases covered at pretty competitive prices (worldwide).

Cheers
Grant

Hey Mallee Boy,
I know about Digital Camera warehouse and all the others. So far I've bought all my lenses online.....

I just felt same as steve when I read his original post. For me, if I'm gonna change it's gotta be before I buy the sigma 10-20 as it's not cheap. I guess somethimes I just wonder if the grass is greener.........LOL

[RiceHigh]

Yes, its true.

As long as availability of lenses is concerned, there is no reason for Pentax.

Today I went to inkley's pondering at lenses.

There wasn't much of a wide available selection, even knowing its a GIANT store I was in. They had endless selections in Sony, Nikon, Canon, etc... but pentax was very neglected.

I asked their employees of "why?" and there wasn't much of a straight answer. I said "... maybe buying my K20D may have been a mistake for one who doesn't have much glass to go with the body" ... they agreed.

I love all the Pentax SLR's I've had. When I had my *istDS it was SWEET knowing how easily it outperformed all it's predecessors. Owning my K20D and purchasing it when it was $1200 because I thought I "just had to have it" being as I'm majoring in photography. Now, When pondering at the counter looking at which lenses I would like to accessorize my K20D in ... I start to feel a little sick wondering if I should switch to a nikon D90 body... I don't have much for lenses for my pentax other than a few basics, but seeing the large and very easy to get variety for nikon just standing there in my face teases me. The D90 body is sweet, maybe not built as well as the K20D but surely feels and seems like it outperforms EASY.

Suggestions?

Maybe pentax will come out with something newer and better, I was expecting so much more with the K20D's firmware, but it still seems like "DOS on an intel iMac". The lack of "mirror-up" bothers me, but support for PC sync flash is sweet. The lack of HDMI live video out bothers me too, i love setting up monitors for subjects. AWB sucks.

Talk me out of switching to nikon. What am I giving up? Don't flame me

[jct us101]

You continue to amaze me.

[cwood]

If you get tired of Canon and decide to part with the 135/2 let me know.

Curious: what body do you use? You mentioned the 85/1.8 being nothing special, but it seems like it really shines on full frame. Friend has one on a 40D and his shots look good, but nothing outstanding; on my 1Ds II it is stunning though.

I have the 1DmkIII. I think the 85/1.8 is a fine lens. I just like the Pentax 77 better.

[RiceHigh]

I have the 1DmkIII. I think the 85/1.8 is a fine lens. I just like the Pentax 77 better.

I have both the EF 85/1.8 and the Pentax FA*85/1.4.

I use both lenses on my full frame 5D for quite some times now. What I would conclude are:

1. EF 85 is an okay lens with good resolution and smooth bokeh, but with no character!

2. Its colour rendition by no means can match the Pentax. Skin tones are not as nice, neither greens are as "green" as the Pentax ;-D

3. Its bokeh is smooth but not solid (I like the FA 85 more, but sometimes it produces "bright rings";

4. The Pentax is sharper at f/2.8 or below;

5. The plane in-focus is flatter for the Pentax than the Canon. Light falloffs at large aperture are similar.

6. Flare resistance of the Pentax is better.

7. Exposure accuracy is better with the Pentax, especially at larger (but not the largest) apertures! (stopped down metering)

But its not totally a fair comparison as the Pentax is of a higher grade and was sold higher anyway.

And, the sad thing is my FA* is just a plain old full manual lens when it is used on my 5D! :-(