Pete, one thing with the grip is that the battery usage may not be as expected or desired. I choose to expend the battery in the grip first. (as opposed to in body first, or both/simultaneous).

The issue is that when the battery in the grip dies, the camera stops working.
You have to manually power the camera off, then back on in order for the fresh in-body battery to kick in. Of course, if the power is off too long, the grip battery "self-charges" back to a point where it will be strong enough to tell the camera that it is OK to use it. So you have one or two shots, and you have to power off/on again.

Rather annoying, as I'd prefer the camera to know what to do when one battery dies without me having to power the thing off first.

And THAT is not in the manuals.

Otherwise, I would probably not use the camera as much without the grip. It is so much more comfortable to hold.

I'm waiting for K11D with the 11MP sensor!
It's just like 10MP but its one louder...

Ever wonder just how much data you can recover from RAW?
I personally haven't made th effort to find out, but today I made a mistake that allowed me to be pleasantly surprised.

Some huge mushrooms popped over the time I was at work today, and for whatever reason my first shot of the nasty thing was wildly over exposed. (The next shot focused on the same spot was excellent, go figure...)

Anyway, I don't want to start a discussion of which is better RAW vs JPEG... both have their benefits and that has been done to death.
I simply found it interesting that I was able to get a reasonable image from the original RAW even though it was so far gone. I have not seen a strong example of how much data can be recovered before.


Now it will not win any awards, it still has some burned out portions, and I would probably still trash it but I was surprised at how much data can be pulled from RAW.

In SilkyPix I dropped the exposure by two stops. It did a lot for recovery, but left the bottom edges of the mushroom rather blue. I saved a second image dropped by one stop, and merged the two.
The following is the before and after.

I generally leave the camera in MTF program mode, unless I am doing sports or other particular photography. Although I don't know if it really makes a difference or if it is one of those eye-candy make-ya-feel-good sort of things like the dust removal system.

Well stated. But, I like animal photography, so long exposures and softness are not the most desired traits in a lens.
Still, I have to say I have taken some photos of my dogs at f/2.8 on the first day and they looked amazing compared to what I'm used to getting.
I think the 50-135 is also sharper at longer focal lengths, which is also normal.

I suppose it is unfair to take some lenses at their extremes and others in their midranges, and expect relevant results. To be fair, I would probably need to take enough photos to create a MTF chart for each. (I'll leave that to some lab techs with the proper equipment - the camera's auto focus and the off camera flash just wont cut it for that sort of quality control).

Vignetting was taken at 135mm. It is much less at 50mm (that seems backwards to me), or if you stop down a bit. Hood makes no difference.

One thing I have to say is I'm surprised my photography hasn't improved!
I spent all this money on the lens and I haven't had one offer to buy my stuff. Argh! Fuzzy bunnies and oil&vinegar are very popular photos, are they not?

Anyway...
I do find the DA* lens fantastic to work with, as far as silent focusing and water resistance are concerned. And when stopped down a stop or so, its results are much better than wide open at f/2.8.

Here are two more images to consider. Again aperture is all the way open at f/2.8. The vignetting is MUCH better at F/4.0, but I have not been able to go back to re-take the reflections photo at another f-stop.
I'll have to try to reproduce here and see what effect there is.

I don't know how this might compare to other lenses, I just happen to be out shooting during my lunch hour and noticed the effects when I got home.

Vignette, f/2.8 1/1000 sec, 135mm



Reflections, f/2.8, 1/5 sec, 50mm
Note the reflections of the lamp posts

Yeah, that is just the way the screen printing (or emulated look) was done on the label. I think lines are just sort of a moire pattern effect.

Done. Just for the DA* at f/2.8 and f/8.0.

Anyway, yeah, I usually get pretty good focusing results with the K10D.
I guess I'll have to play for a while and see if it is the DA* lens or just me, somehow.

I agree with your last assessment. I don't expect these to be concrete laws dictating the lens' ability. I am not working in a lab but I did take several shots and they seemed to be consistent.
So in a "real world" sense, these should give a good feel of behavior.
In general this is the closest thing to a lab environment my photography ever gets. I am usually hand held and in all sorts of conditions.
In the end, I guess these images really don't mean a lot.

Anyway, I also have some interesting shots I'll have to post of the vignetting and reflections in the 50-135 lens. Unfortunately I don't have comparisons against other lenses, so I may hold off until I can try to duplicate the environment.

OK, round two...

Auto focusing on a tight target is very hit or miss. My first attempt to redo the test was to focus on the head of a large nail on a plain background. High contrast, nail was perpendicular to ground (basically a single narrow plane of focus to contend with). After twenty minutes I found it was impossible to auto focus correctly... manual focus even with my bad eyesight allowed a much sharper image! That is just wrong. (Who knows what was happening with the irregular surface of my last test subject!!)


Anyway, this time I used a flat plane for focusing to help eliminate the chance that the camera roamed to the wrong spot. Autofocus was now quite easy with a larger area to connect upon.


Taking some suggestions, all images are at 50mm f/8.0. (I threw a couple of f/2.8 for the 50-135 and the 50mm prime for comparison).
I also added an image from the far edge of the DA* 50-135 at f/8.0. The sharpness is pretty consistent with the center.

For consistent focusing, I centered on the text "Extra Virgin Olive Oil" for all images. Again not all 50mm lenses have the same field of view, so the images aren't exactly the same. But they are all 100% crops with the same pixel width/height.

http://moringello-east.no-ip.com:8080/public/images/lens_test_2/

Notes:
1. The DA* looks abysmal at f/2.8. Could this be my fault? I made several attempts with the same results. I guess this softness is normal on lenses when open wide, but I was surprised by the extent of suckage, er, um "softness".
2. The 18-55 lens is still a bit darker than the rest (I made no attempt to make corrections or other falsifying changes to the images)
3. The 50mm f/1.4 prime lens is petty good at both f/2.8 and f/8.0


** Hopefully I covered everything and have decent test.
I tried to let the camera and lens do the work they were meant to do, and I did not try to fudge the results with extra processing of the images.
If something is inconsistently focused or metered, I do not believe it is my fault... but I am open to suggestions on how to determine that or make corrections.