K10D prime lens choices.

My purchase of K10 looks to be closer now. However, I was uder the impression that there were/are lots of lens choices for pentax 'k' mount as the advertising implies.

In reality when looking for lenses with a real view to actually using and aquiring them there appear to be VERY few prime lenses in the most useful focal lengths,.....but, I may have this completely wrong so I am wondring if anyone here can give me some good pointers or advice.

If I have it right, pentax appear to not be making ANY prime lenses in the short lengths which are actually available....?

I will need a good moderate wide with f2 max aperture and a good short tele with f2 or better. The Pentax 50mm in f1.7 and f1.4 are fairly common on ebay as is 28mm2.8 but the 24mm seems very rare/uncommon.

I don't use 35mm but when I did my most used lens was the 35mm f2. In 6x6 Iam mostly using the 'standard' 80mm and 50mm. In 4x5 I use the 90mm mostly,..about three quarters of exposures with most of the other quarter being 210mm

As far as I can see the only primes that I can buy new for a k10 right now are the Sigma 20mm f1.8 (30mm equiv.F/F) and Sigma 24mmf1.8 (36mm equiv. so apparently ideal for me)

I'm not interested in any lenses in the pipeline as these are not actually available and will be exorbitantly priced for the foreseeable.

Any intelligent chat about this would be greatly appreciated.

Check out the Sigma 30 mm f1.4, I am not too sure though if it's available in PKAF....

I have recently bought FA 28 f2.8 and FA 50 mm 1.4, to go with my FA* 85 f1.4 (rare, desirable and therefore expensive), and Takumar-K 135 f2.5 (cheap and very good)...

I have the Sigma 20 mm f1.8 but it does not get much use...

Thank you for your reply,

Yes, I do know about the Sigma 30mm f1.4. However, on DSLR's this would equate to 45mm, or 'standard lens' view which is probably my least used lens type with other formats although I DO use the 80mm with 6x6 sometimes.

I find it interesting that there is such a lack of fast 24mm lenses for DSLR as this equates to 35mm in 35mmfilm cameras and that was always a very important focal length,.....if I remember correctly Leica were making no fewer than five 35mm lenses at one time and 35mm was one of the 3 viewfinder frames built into the Leica r/f cameras starting with the M2.....

Even stranger, Nikon used to make a 24mm f2 lens but there seems to have not been any attempt to re-launch it for their DSLR range.

For these (and other) reasons I wonder if makers know that sensor size will soon change back to F/F or near F/F because they certainly seem to have been dragging their collective feet with wide primes for APS-C sensor cameras.

Have a read from the 7th post down on this thread
https://www.pentaxuser.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3640&postdays=0&postord...

Matt explains why the 1.5 rule does not apply to wide angle lenses.

From what he says I'm not sure a 24mm will become 35mm on DSLR's - hopefully Matt will read this and let you know

".......Matt explains why the 1.5 rule does not apply to wide angle lenses...."

Roger, Matt is refering to fisheye wides, not rectilinear lenses....

I can absolutely asure you that a 24mm on DSLR (APS-C) will give the same angle of view to a 35mm (37mm to nearest digit) lens on a 35mm film camera.

And it's only some types of fisheyes too

Angle of view - 1.5x (roughly) always.

From the current set there's all the pancakes. And, not trying to be cheeky, but the modern zooms are remarkably good in terms of image quality. You've really got to try them on the K10D, rather than just assuming that a prime is better.

And yes, some of them are mighty expensive. Such as the SMC-DA 12-24. But it's astonishingly sharp and clear on the K10D.... yet I still absolutely love the SMC-DA 16-45 for versatility and IQ. And reasonably priced too.

BTW, there are some full sized shots on my pbase site (with watermarks) of the K10D and a few lenses. That might give you some idea. Though to be honest, I haven't had too much time for serious images lately

Matt

What about the FA*24mm f2.0 - if you can find one? I also remember someone posting an example recently taken with the DA 14mm which looked rather impressive... Yes, that's a seriously expensive option but kinda kills your arguement that there are NO wide primes available! How w i d e do you want? From the same range, as Matt says there's the DA 21mm Pancake. Going slightly longer the FA35mm is a cracker as a standard on the K10D and there's a few places with them available new at the moment. For other standard options, just ask George about the 31mm Ltd...

What about the A series 20mm and 24mm? They're not exactly the easiest lenses to find but would seem to fit the bill for you quite well?

I think it's fair to say that there are indeed a few options for a WA prime to fit on the front of a K10D...

Will

And I'm going to add another to the list that I forgot - FA 20mm f2.8...

To save you the trouble of asking.....

The 31mm is my most used lens, and aside from the rather silly permanent lens hood (which is not much use on digital), I have nothing bad to say about it. Image quality is superb.

Also, the FA 20mm is fine, and available on Ebay. I'm happy with mine. The FA* 24 is alleged to suffer from CA on digital, but whether the allegers are pixel-peepers or humans, I don't know.

There are of course also the 43mm Ltd (lovely, though a slightly awkward focal length on digital, which is why mine is on sale), and the 14mm and the 21mm, as Will has mentioned.

Two points:

1 As Matt says, modern zooms are capable of results to rival prime lenses. The downside is that they are not as fast. But unless speed is absolutely essential to you, it is unwise to ignore them.

2 And don't ignore Ebay either - or other second-hand sources. Almost all my lenses came from Ebay (including two of my Limiteds. The other came from a contributor to this thread!). Whatever you might have read about Ebay, it works pretty well 99% of the time.

G

PS: I reckon that the following wide prime lenses range from good to great, and are relatively easy to get hold of:

DA 14mm
FA 20mm
DA 21mm Ltd
FA 28mm
FA 31mm Ltd
FA 35mm
DA 40mm Ltd
FA 43mm Ltd

Not too bad, surely? And that's just AF lenses.

Shameless plug ALERT
But it does have some relevance - my A series 28mm has been listed on ebay today, it's in cracking cond with hardly a mark on it. Look for the same username as on here...