Low light lens recommendation

Hey guys! Not sure if any of you remember me - probably not. But I joined a few months ago

I just upgraded and got myself the k5 and I'm loving it but I want more! I'm trying to find a good low light lens as I have a bunch of low light stuff planned ahead so I want to be able to get good photos.

Preferably auto-focus as I'm still not great at manual focusing and I will have to be snapping quickly. Any help would be great.

I have a prince range of about £400.

Thanks guys!

I think many will suggest the FA 50mm 1.4 as a very good starting point for a "fast" lens. If it's too narrow, then the Sigma 30 1.4 is also a good recommendation. Both should be well within £400.

Are you looking for zooms as well? If so, any of the 2.8's will do (18-50, 24-70, 28-75).

Oh thankyou very much! Will the 2.8 be good for concert photography?

I think for concert photography, it's either an 85mm 1.4 if you can get close enough, or if not, the standard is a 70-200 2.8 (but these cost at around £500 upwards).

Shoot the majority of my concert photography with the DA* 50-135mm & the Tamron 17-50mm, very rarely use my 50 1.4

There are lots of old M series 50mm lenses f 1.7 and f1.4 that can be had for £30 to £50 if you want to experiment. Autofocus probably won't work very well in low light anyway. But as you have a K5 any f2.8 is probably fast enough. It really is incredibly good even at ISO3200.
You'd be better off getting a decent tripod first.

I've just shot a concert entirely on the DA35mm f2.4 but it was at the Dress Rehearsal so I had access to go anywhere. I was shooting at 800ISO and 1/90 at f3.5

TBH I would find a tripod a bit of a liability, you can't easily use it in amongst seats or in the pit, there just isn't enough room and you can't react quickly enough. I often used to use a monopod before SR.

I also use the Pentax-F 50mm f1.7 and occasionally the Opteka 85mm f1.4

Agreed , my comments were for general low light photography.
Concerts are usually relatively well lit , at least the band members, and shouldn't be a problem for the K5.

I've owned the FA50mm 1.4 in the past and it was an excellent lens, the one problem I had with it though is that I found the focal length a bit too long for general use, I now use the FA 35 F2 and find it pretty much perfect. There's obviously the new DA 35mm (which I've also owned), differences between the 2 are probably minimal but for reasons difficult to explain I prefer the FA

Simon

If you do pick up the FA50 1.4, one thing to realise is that it's slightly soft at 1.4, but pretty sharp by 2, so since you have a k5, it's worth sticking it on AV, setting the aperture to 2, and upping the ISO if necessary. Don't take this as a negative for the lens - I really like mine, but I find some of my other primes to be sharper wide open (though none of them are 1.4!). and by f5.6-f8 the fa50 is superbly sharp!

I don't in general struggle with autofocus on my k-5 at the shows I have shot with it so far, I also have no issue shooting at iso 2000 either...

K-5 DA* 50-135mm 2.8

ISO 1600
1/250
f/2.8