FA lenses

I have put a K-1 in the virtual shopping basket but before pressing the button I am taking a long cool look at the lens situation. Whilst the camera will work with DA sized lenses, and you can see the crop frame in the viewfinder, in reality these won't be very satisfactory. A cropped image may be ok for telephoto as I often crop these anyway, but for wide angle it is counterproductive as you would be far better off with a longer lens over the full frame. So, with that in mind I was considering the new 24-70 F2.8 as the best general purpose lens, until I picked one up. This is not one to have on the camera on the offchance of a shot, and the 15-30 F2.8 is even more bulky which leaves the slower but more manageable 28-105 F3.5-5.6. So, I reckoned a couple of FA primes would be a much better option but whilst the range might have top quality optics and build none appear to be weather-resistant. There are no plans in the pipeline for updated primes so if weather-resistance is an important factor (and this is a big selling point for the K-1) the only lenses are the very expensive and bulky zoom lenses recently introduced. Hmm......

If you follow this link and go to the bottom of page, you will find a lens road map which implies some single focal length lenses appearing in 2017. Possibly updated primes made WR?

I´m selling some F & FA lenses at the moment in the classified pages, while not weather proofed the 2 FA lenses cover 28-80 & 80-320 full frame and the F covers 28-80.
Very cheap and useful for the K1.
Check them out.....

I think the only weather resistant wide angles for FF would be the old FA* 24mm f/2 or the FA* 28-70mm f/2.8 but the US forum tested a copy of that recently and it was awful at 70mm.

The FA* 28-70mm f/2.8 is a superb lens, so if one tested was awful then it must have been damaged at some time. They are quite old lenses now, so some will have been handled badly. Reviews at the time were very complimentary.

Thanks for the link, The Ricoh Imaging UK site still only has the old 2015 roadmap. Still, it looks as if you are right about some new primes which is welcome news but a shame there are no more new lenses this year unless they spring a surprise!

Thanks John; I have the old 28-80 f3.5-4.5 which would do, but the difference in focussing speed and quietness with the new lenses is amazing. Also, it hasn't got great reviews so I'm not sure it would do justice to the new camera. I will look out for the lens you mention but I confess to being very particular about condition!

Just looked on eBay - there are some FA* 28-70mm f/2.8 lenses from Japan listed from about £485 to £743 so they clearly retain value (for now).

I am also minded that the new lens prices will come down in a few months as instanced by the 150-450 telephoto.

Another edit! The Pentax Ricoh Imaging UK site has the new FA 28-105mm F3.5-5.6ED DC WR with an RRP of £499.99 but go to the store, and all retailer sites, it is £549.99. I have seen another instance of price boosting during this £130.00 off promo offer with up to £100 difference so not as good as it seems.

I have gone for the 28-105 bundle. If it is anything like as good as the 16-85 that is currently my most used lens with the K5II then I will be happy. I already have a Sigma 24-70 2.8 if I need something faster but I expect the 28-105 will get used more because it is lighter and weatherproof. I have some FF primes but I generally find I use zooms more than primes.

Yes, the 28-105 will probably come down in price but it still seems a reasonable deal at the bundle price. The more expensive options will probably drop in price by a lot more in time.

I'm pretty certain that the FA* lenses are not weather resistant!

The FA*28-70 is slightly soft at maximum aperture at 70mm (I've used several copies) but stopping down slightly helps greatly - I'm with Mr Riley on his view of that particular copy . At the wide end it is Prime quality - the very first snaps I took when trying out my copy made me check the settings twice - I couldn't believe how sharp they were at 28mm and f2.8.

Rob is quite right that there is a poor selection of WR Primes for full frame at present, particularly in Wide Angle, but we can only hope that Pentax will follow up the K1 launch with a stunning selection of quality lenses.

Personally I suspect that many of the older lenses (including mid-quality zooms) will perform better than many think. The late FA zooms (20-35, 24-90, etc) are very good quality and I use them regularly on APS-C digital - I think will be in demand once we start to see their results on FF

I'm regretting letting my 24-90mm go now. Originally I'd thought that the 12-24mm plus the 24-90mm would be great together, but in practice too many shots were around the 24mm point and needed constant lens changing. On full frame it's an ideal standard lens.

I agree with LennyBloke....especially on FA20-35. It was a late addition to FA zoom family....but that lens is amazing. Really lightweight and compact. It is about the size of FA31 limited (without hood) and I think it is even lighter. Focus is super quick but loud. Its imited range is still quite okay for street photography and landscapes. The image quality is great, especially on wider end.....great lens.
Only downside is that you have to be very careful with it, as its polycarbonate body is quite fragile.