| Review of: SMC Pentax-DA 70mm F2.4 Limited by selfnoise on Wed August 21, 2019 | Rating: 9 | View more reviews | |
Views: 420217
Reviews: 102
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The single best thing about this lens is the size. People do not register that I am shooting with a tele lens, pretty much ever. I use the lens to take candids of my kids and I find they are much less likely to be annoyed by Dad with his camera.
The lens is quite sharp but doesn't take it too far, so it's great for portraits. There's some debate regarding the bokeh vs the 77mm, but I think this lenses rendition of out of focus areas is quite nice. It's very neutral and unobtrusive.
I really don't have anything bad to say about the lens, so here's a picture of my cat.
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| Review of: SMC Pentax-DA 35mm F2.8 Limited Macro by selfnoise on Wed August 21, 2019 | Rating: 10 | View more reviews | |
Views: 492595
Reviews: 123
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With a focus limiter this would be a perfect lens. But life is not perfect!
As it is, it's some of Pentax's finest work. It is very sharp, but avoids the sort of clinically sharp look of some macros. Nice bokeh, nice contrast from the usually good Pentax coatings. The focus damping is the best I've used outside of Takumar era lenses and the overall feel of the lenses build is super premium. The built in hood is sort of addictive to pull out, like cocking a tiny gun.
Autofocus is ok, but really hurt by the long focus throw considering that Pentax cameras like to hunt sometimes. I do NOT recommend using contrast detect AF with this lens, it's a huge pain.
This lens is an incredibly good match with the Pentax KP... I use it to shoot macros handheld with the KP's edge extract focus peaking on manual mode. I wish the lens cap didn't scratch so easily, mine looks like it has been in combat just from, I dunno, being in my empty pocket? Annoying.
Overall I'd say it's in the running for best walkaround prime lens for APS-C pentax. For me it's this or the 70mm.
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| Review of: SMC Pentax-DA 40mm F2.8 Limited by selfnoise on Wed August 21, 2019 | Rating: 8 | View more reviews | |
Views: 576040
Reviews: 148
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I'd say this lens is "very sharp" at 16 megapixels on the K50, but at 24 megapixels on the KP it starts to separate from a lens like the 35mm limited or 70mm limited. It's a touch softer, but not in an unpleasant way. Just not quite as the level of those lenses.
Shooting with the 40mm on the KP is a delight as it serves to offset the weight of the camera and it's just a fun thing to use in practice. Manual focus is not as tricky as I had feared. I'd love it if the minimum focus distance was a hair closer and the lens cap is a pain in the butt.
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| Review of: SMC Pentax-DA 16-45mm F4 by selfnoise on Wed May 14, 2008 | Rating: 8 | View more reviews | |
Views: 462360
Reviews: 120
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I bought this lens recently just before a trip to Ireland and have been really satisfied with it. It is not ideally sharp but it has great color rendition, exposes very reliably, and gives good performance at every length. I almost never took it off the camera on my trip and it produced a large quantity of keepers. It is particularly nice now that it's less expensive, and I wish there was a longer zoom that had the same value for money.
UPDATE:
I wrote this review in 2008. It's now 2017 and this is still my primary lens. It's occasionally imperfect, especially on the wide end, but the color and contrast I get out of the lens is so reliable that I hardly ever use anything else.
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