New DA* 300mm F4 + test shot

I got my new DA* 300mm F4 from SRS today. I've only had chance to test for 30mins, I'm going to Muncaster Castle tomorrow so hopefully I'll have a few Heron and Owl shots to show you.
My first impression of the lens is there could be a 100-300mm F4 EX Sigma for sale soon.
The autofocus is so quiet you keep wondering if it is actually working, it is very quick to focus admittedly it was in good bright conditions that I tested it. I had time to test it with a Kenko 1.5X converter and the SDM still worked although it was a little slower at focussing.
Can't wait for tomorrow, I hope it doesn't rain, although I suppose that doesn't matter too much now

Will you not find just having 300mm rather than the range of 100 - 300mm too restrictive :

We look forward to seeing an owl or a heron in this week's competition

I take mainly wildlife shots and have found that 99% of my shots are taken at 300mm, so decided to go for the better quality of a Prime and hopefully I will be able to use the 300mm with a 1.5X converter to give 450mm at F5.6 and a 1.7X converter to give me 510mm at F6.3, well thats the theory.
I also found the 100-300mm F4 a bit heavy for a walkabout wildlife lens, the 300mm F4 is smaller and lighter.

where are the test shots with and without teleconverter?

I'll try and get some today. I might struggle with the converter it's a bit grey up north today (whats new!).
I've never posted any photos yet, do they have to be a link to another site?
If so it might take me a while to upload them.

Here are some instructions for posting images. I'd only post 800x600 or 1024x768 (or there abouts) images and have crop sections for detail. Otherwise it takes ages to upload for you and ages to download for everyone else.

Instructions/Guide:
https://www.pentaxuser.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5446

Congrats!! It seems you may the first to have one. Haven't come across any other on the various forums...

Looking forward to samples and further impressions! I hope someone will be able to compare to the FA*300 soon!!

Wim

I got one too at the same time from SRS along with a 70mm DA Limited. The 300mm f4 looks like a lovely lens from the indoor quick tests that I've done, but like mille19, the weather here hasn't been conducive to any outdoor shots.

I also tried it with the Kenko 1.5x converter and SDM still works well, though I do wonder how the SR will cope as I've not had much luck with IQ with using various TC's with any lens I have.

I'm still waiting to see what the mysterious "Rear Converter for SDM" actually is on the Pentax roadmap.

Same. I have read some suggestions elsewhere (mainly depressingreview) that it could allow regular lenses to be SDM? but surely if they can do that they would put it in the body, it would be an incredible selling point.

It would be fantastic to have a modern SDM equivalent of the 1.7 AF converter, but I'd guess the money will be on a standard converter with SDM pass-through.

only way I can see of doing that is to make a carbon copy of the 1.7xAF converter and put SDM motors in it. Not that this is impossible or anything, but such a unit is of limited use with the SDM lenses. I think I would rather see a converter with pass through power contacts and the necessary electronics to tell the camera that the focal length has changed.

the major market for a converter has got to be as a partner for the fast lenses, which are mostly SDM natively, so why re-invent the wheel?

It couldn't allow regular lenses to become SDM, as its a technology built in to each lens.

However, if there is a decision made in the future to make new lenses only SDM, then a converter to allow these to autofocus with older models makes sense.

Edit:

The updated road map of 18th March 2008 specifically says 'Rear converter for SDM'. It doesn't say 'Teleconverter with SDM' or 'SDM Teleconverter' i.e. no mention of the word 'tele'.

Saying 'Rear converter for..' could obviously mean anything they want it to at this point, and as always, until announced there is always going to be speculation!

I was in the Yodobashi camera store in Osaka, Japan and was looking at the 300 mm lens....

I am also a happy EX 100-300 camper....

The DA* 300 does look like a nice lens and I was tempted... but I was desparately looking for something that wasn't covered in my lens arsenal and that one lens was the DA* 50-135....

And it's cheaper in the UK

It could be done to the extent they achieved auto-focus for manual lenses with the AF 1.7x converter. That is, you rough focus your lens manually and the converter fine focuses using an SDM motor moving an element in the converter.

That makes some sense and could work, but this converter could be anything really, the presumption is that it will be a teleconverter, but I'm sure if it was, they would call it that!

The quote was just me being specific! It cannot make a lens SDM, but it could use SDM to focus, very different things! I can already see images in my head about someone listing an old M series lens as SDM, innit!