Since those shots are the last ones I've taken with this, I'll bump this here. Offers most definitely considered; I'd prefer to sell here than on EBay...
Since there's a new one on EBay for £320, let's price it now at £275.

Bret

I have a job for work coming up, taking stills at an event. For that I really, really want a 50-135. Why? Because I can get the candids from a distance, it's f2.8, and the focus will be close enough that with that, a macro, and a 28 or so, I have pretty much every base covered.

For portraits I tend to use my 50, it allows me to get close enough to do nice head / shoulders without needing to be far away.

Bret

- a K-5.

ba-doom-tish.

Or maybe my coat?

Bret

very nice.

and there's always another train

Bret - who does something like thirty thousand miles a year on trains

I suspect adorama and 47th street will be around the same. As will amazon.

You've got it pretty good in the UK at the moment, you really should believe it.

Now work out what's going to happen when they implement the cuts........

Bret

The prices in Germany are solid, too, I've been surprised by that, but the race to the bottom has not happened with the D7000 / 7D / K5 that I would possibly have expected.

Oh, and your prices already do match German ones. €1180 for a K5 is "normal". Right now, that's just over £1k. And Germany is the cheapest market in the EU that's worth mentioning, at least in my experience.

I don't see the proliferation of gear as a problem; gear doesn't mean capability to take good photos.

Bret

er... that's only against the yen. Try the US Dollar or the Euro.

There's a lot more variation there - and volatility also has to be paid for somewhere.

Bret

no, but the DA-L series all have plastic mounts. A new 55-300 is at least two hundred and fifty quid. The standard kit lenses for the k-x were in part DA-Ls. And before you ask, other differences include no lens hoods, at least for the 55-300.

Bret

I'd say that's rather lovely and simply needs a decent follow focus to make the most of it....

Bret

let's think this through? the trend is towards more complex lenses and inflation has seriously hit on pretty much everything. We're talking 30% in some areas in a year. Do you really think that lens manufacturers are immune to this? My transport costs have gone up well over 15% in the last 12 months from the UK and that's without the VAT rises. I suspect that the 2008 prices are the lowest and someone somewhere said "enough! this stuff is too cheap, we need to make more money on this".

Your economy is in the toilet (or at least that's what the currency guys think) and your exchange rate is down as a result. It's at the lowest point now since the new year, and I really do keep a close eye on this.

Moral? Prices for *everything* are on their way up. Lenses will be spectacularly hit if you ask me, as they don't have to sell that many - they'd rather sell fewer but at a greater profit margin, and I think that applies to a lot of things.
Just look at the prices of rigs... (google zacuto)

Bret