Be very careful here... if you look down the list of the Sigma flashes at MicroGlobe, you'll see the EF500 DG Super listed again further down, as

"Sigma EF-500 DG Super P-TTL Shoe Mount Flash for Pentax with P-TTL Operation" - for £155, much more in line with other stores.

The £89 one doesn't say P-TTL; I have a memory that early versions of this flash didn't have all the capabilities, and would need rechipping before they would. I can't recall the details, but it looks a bit like they're trying to flog off old stock.

Is it realistic, these days, to expect to get paid to do weddings, and not end up having to spend quite a lot of time at a computer?

I'd guess probably not... so maybe that influences the film/digital issue.

If he's going to buy all this lot, maybe the extra couple of hundred on the K10D instead of the istD wouldn't go amiss. It's a bit bigger too, making the grip completely unnecessary IMO.

I wonder how many replies you'll get next time you do this.

Now that I've had the 10 for a few months, I'm glad I waited so long before going digital.

Most of my photography is opportunistic, rather than constructed, so I often find that I have to crop a bit - sometimes a lot - to get the composition right.

I'm aware that I still need to do a lot of work with framing and composition, so that I make better use of the available pixels, but I find it hard to imagine how I'd do with only 6 million.

I suppose my composition would be better now, if I'd had to.

I don't think I've read anything here that's been anything less than highly complimentary about the K100D, and certainly no derision.

You refer to a number of differences between the 10 and the 100, but not the fact that the 10 has a 10 MP sensor, and the 100 a 6 MP sensor. The 100D has a pentamirror viewfinder, not a pentaprism.

Also, the 10 has a host of auto features, so I'm not clear what you're getting at here.

The specs are here:

K10D: http://www.digital.pentax.co.jp/en/35mm/k10d/spec.html

K100D: http://www.digital.pentax.co.jp/en/35mm/k100d/spec.html

I'd probably agree that at £300 for camera and 18-55, the 100D offers better value for money than the 10D.

Edit: I notice from the specs that the 100D has a bunch of exposure modes listed as "(1) Auto Picture mode; (2) Portrait mode; (3) Landscape mode; (4) Macro mode (5) Action mode; (6) Night scene portrait mode;"

Was this what you were referring to? What do they actually do? Are they useful?

When friends get kittens, there's only one thing to do...



Bigger version at:
http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t244/chris5gd/Public/IMGP4388.jpg

The one above's probably the best, but these are fun too:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Chris5gd/SimonAndNicoleSKittens?authkey=25Bn7FDaKEg

I need to clean the front element on one of my SMC Pentax lenses.

It's not terribly dirty, just a few specks that aren't dust. But it'll need a little rubbing, and I don't want to risk the coating.

Any tips?

TIA

Quite like the third one, for the reasons you say.

First one's too dark, with too little of interest to contrast with the subtlety of the bits you can see.

Don't like the second one at all - the cannon is great, and might have been good on its own. But the tower sticks a bit too randomly up into the background for my liking, which is a bit grotty anyway IMO.

But I do think the other lot are loads better.

Even more so since mine is a Pentax family too (three of us (all on the forum here, too!!) within 200 yards with endless Pentax cameras and lenses - I probably have the fewest of the lot) - my brother has a 75-300 FAJ which I had a bit of a go with before buying yours. So now we have two between us. You need to get a second one, obviously..