Handlep, I would add that it is very rarely worth using a teleconverter on consumer lenses - they can degrade the image quality, and cropping is usually more effective. Teleconverters are most useful on prime lenses, which have a higher image quality to start with and can handle the degredation. They can be used on zooms, but they are usually only recommended for high quality ones.

Don't forget that a 2x teleconverter will also make the light your camera receives 4x dimmer, so a tripod is almost essential.

If you are looking for more reach, you could consider the excellent Pentax 55-300 zoom lens. The "L" version is available for approximately £200 new.

I use a K200, and so only have one control wheel. I find Sv mode very useful in rapidly changing light (e.g. at sunrise/sunset) as it's fiddly to be constantly pressing buttons to change the ISO in other modes.

Ross,

Welcome to the forum! We hope you find it welcoming and helpful.

Adqam

>Are wide angle lenses the same thing as a fish eye?
No, they are not. A fish eye lens captures a much larger field of view at the expense of extreme distortion.

>Does a wide angle gradually become a fish eye the shorter the focal length and if so, roughly at what point?
No.

>Ideally, I'd like to get a wide angle lense for landscapes et al.
If someone can recommend one (hopefully not too expensive) I'd be very grateful.

Define expensive! Wide angle lenses are typically not cheap. One of the better lenses for Pentax is the 12-24, which you can find badged as Samsung for around £400.

>I don't know if my next question falls into a similar category or not but I'll ask anyway:
I've seen some 50mm fast f1.8, f1.4, f2.8 lenses about as well. Is it to say that you cannot zoom with these lenses? Is it right to think that they have a very big aperture, as such allow lots of light in and thus for fast(er) shutter speeds?

Yes. Don't forget that a big aperture will also give you a small depth of field.

The FA purportedly has superior electronics, comminucating things such as MTF info to the camera for MTF-program mode and the like. The FA is also much nicer to look at!

The F designates it as an autofocus lenses. I understand that, as Clarky states, the two are optically identical, although I futher have heard that the FA has a nicer construction and has more advanced electronics, supporting MTF information and the like.

I recall the last one on ebay going for something like £3000, give or take £500.

Fabson, there are a few factors that contribute to this that you might like to bear in mind. Firstly, as you rightly point out, the depth of field is reduced with the Pentax. This means that achieving the correct focus is even more important. You might like to consider some kind of eyepiece magnifier, or the like, which makes critical focus easier to determine.

Secondly, it is usally the case that point and shoot cameras apply a significant amount of sharpening, de-noising and saturation enhancement, whereas the images that come out of a dSLR will be more "flat". This is in part due to the assumption that dSLR owners will modify the image according to their own tastes in post-production. You don't specify if you are shooting raw or jpeg - if the latter, you could try adjusting the camera's built-in settings to increase the sharpness of your images.

Barrie,

I'm not quite sure what you are driving at, but in essence the SDHC protocol can only deal with a certain amount of memory - the camera will not be able to "see" anything more than 32GB. Please realise that the camera has to pick where on the memory card to put data, so if it cannot see more than 32GB, it can only put 32GB worth of data onto the card.

Others may disagree, but I would get a third party flash (like the Metz 48AF-1) that has swivel and tilt before buying the pentax AF360 again. It's a great flash, but as the head can only tilt and not swivel I find it awkward when shooting portrait.