Which lens to go with a K-5?

I almost headed out to SRS this morning, but thought I'd read a little more first.

Possibly a bad move - I've now been put off the Pentax 18-135 a little by both John's review, and even more so the Photozone one.

I want a general purpose walk-around lens, so the handling qualities that John wrote so glowingly about are very appealing. Not too worried about the distortion, but the CA and general fall-off towards the long end are a bit troubling.

Alternatives I'm now condidering are the Sigma and Tamron 18-200s. I realise that they don't have the same reach, or the WR, but nor do they have the price.

So, as usual, I'm dithering

I'd appreciate any thoughts, or any other suggestions.

Well although I haven't bought one yet, if I'd been in the K-5 market now I would do because the K-5/18-135 package is now at the right price.

I can't add much to the review except to reiterate that technical tests are not everything and the lens had many merits, not least of which were the handling and weather resistance. The same can be said of the 18-250mm as well, so perhaps it could be looked at in the same was as that lens is?

I found the handling and the build quality also very good and the focus was accurate and fast.
For general photography i think it's a good lens though, this is also said in those reviews. Just don't buy the lens purely to take landscape photos or such.

I have one. I bought it as a travel lens.
I'm quite happy to take it as my only lens if I have to travel light.

Of course it's not up to a *lens IQ wise, but it is far better than the Photozone review implies, and unlike my *lens it gets used .

Funny enough John's review implies the same thing
Only the scoring of photozone was very bad though.

Maybe get an 18-135 on loan to give it a try? I'd be suprised if the Pentax DA18-135 is any worse then the 18-200 offerings which from what I've read are ok lenses but nothing special, and certainly don't seem to compare well to the 18-250.

The reason I mention trying a lens is that I bought a used Tamron 18-250 having read the many glowing user reports about the lens but having tried it I just couldn't live with it, probably because I've been spoilt by the high quality of my Pentax DA 17-70 which is certainly the one I'd recommend although it obviously doesn't have the range you mention

Simon

That kind of zoom does not come without compromises, if you absolutely cannot live with a two lens setup then you will have to deal with the tradeoffs. I doubt the 18-135 is as bad as it sounds especially compared to 18-200/18-250s around in real life usage.

The 18-135 from Nikon was pretty bad and the 18-200 had plenty of problems too while being quite a beast of a lens.

Buy it s a package with your K-5 if you dont get along with it sell it and get something with less reach (17-70 sounds like a good one) or the excellent for its price 17-50 from Tamron. Doubt you will lose much in terms of cash as the package seems to be a decent price at the mom.

Of course, now why didn't I think of that.

Obvious, now you mention it.

I think it's a plan.

That's a very good point too. Thinking about it, the 18-55 is fine most of the time when I'm out and about. So a bit more at each end might do the trick in reality.

I think I have two pretty decent options, now, and less and less reason to delay by the moment!

Thanks all.. appreciate your thoughts.

Mike-P posted some pics he took with the 18-135 photo section. while I was highly impressed with Mike's photo skills I wasn't impressed with the IQ of the lens at all.

Given how much Topaz was used on those photos it is impossible to say anything about the quality of the lens imho.

I have the 17-70 as well as the 18-135. I love the 17-70 but it can hunt and fail to focus, something the 18-135 never does. I won't be getting rid of the 17-70 though .

I agree with Gwyn. If the purpose is to show the qualities of a lens it's much better to show normal, recognisable images with a minimum of processing. Just straight shots tell us something.

To be fair, Mike was showing us his images, not the lens, so the purpose was different.

Gaaah!

You lot just make trouble... I want both of them now !!

To offer a curve-ball I have the Sigma 17-70 which I can't praise enough for sharpness. It's that sharp at 5.6 I can crop heavily from 70mm. Plus it does 1:2 macro very nicely indeed.

I bought it to replace my 18-250 and have a better quality standard zoom.

I now do not miss my 18-250 and wouldn't dream of getting the 18-135; there's just no point. (From IQ/focal lengths perspective - weather sealing aside of course....)

Another good thought, thanks.

How is it for purple fringing? Not necessarily a good comparison, but I recall the Tamron 70-300 was pretty sharp for a budget lens, but had shocking PF, which would invariably ruin (or at least make for a lot of faffing on the computer) any trees-against-sky shots. I wouldn't want to go back there.