I'm finding that since buying DA 300* I'm not using this lens anymore, so it'll have to go. Owned from new purchased from SRS in mint condition.
Comes complete with camo neoprene multipart cover, 86mm UV filter and variable ND filter, everything from new, boxed, case, caps, for a zoom in good lighting the quality is excellent.

Asking £475 for the lot + postage/fees if appropriate

Quick bump, listed elsewhere and price drop to £120 + delivery/fees if appropriate for a quick sale.

Decided to part with my Q, comes with everything from new, excellent condition. You'll get original Q body, 5-15mm lens in original packaging, Fotodiox lens mount adapter for Pentax PK lenses with aperture control, Kipon T-Q mount for astrophotography and large Pentax Q neoprene case.
Eveything is in excellent condition, one or two marks on the silver body of the lens is as much as you will find to distinguish from new on this kit.
Looking for £140 + delivery/fees if appropriate.




By way of an example of what this camera and T-mount can do on 4" Nexstar telescope, this is uncropped.

Just a few shots today whilst the sun was out

1: Bright and breezy



2: Ground Grazing Goldfinch



3: Blue Tit



4: Moorhen

Don't worry about Metz being a manual flash, it isn't. The Pentax specific model has P-TTL, hence the limited manual controls, it doesn't need them. The camera will calculate the amount of flash power required, when using bounce any additional flash required can be added through the camera flash settings.
Yongnuo flash however is fully manual albeit with a large range of manual controls. Maybe not the best though when working with young children and you've got limited opportunities for the right shot.

I've a Metz36, which is a solid enough cheap on camera flash, but around the same sort of price particularly used I'd probably say to go for Sigma ef-500 st or super or even 530 if you can find one, principally because you'll be able to bounce of the ceiling in portrait mode with the swivel head and it's slightly more powerful. You should be able to pick up a good used sigma for £50-£60. The super is perhaps worth the little bit extra as it has off camera functionality as a slave. I'm sure there'll be a lot of advice for the Pentax 36 flash but the model I had the battery door wasn't very durable and they carry a premium price even second hand, and the guide number is no more powerful than the £50 Metz.

Focusing with K-5 is perhaps trickier without focus peaking but one thing I did do was improve the focusing mechanism on the 4se, which has a very small sensitive dial making fine focusing quite difficult. You could try a peg on the focus dial to increase the radius of the focusing dial. I have a cap which fits over the focus dial with a bar fitted to it which does the same thing but is neater and more secure. I have a picture with K-5ii and 4se in my portfolio.
The other thing of course is that k-5 has a crop factor of 1.5 being APS-C and the Q 5.5, so using prime focus with a Q body gets you significantly closer to the moons features.

No problem, I'll sort that out for you. When I purchased the Q I bought a Kipon T2 to Pentax Q mount from eBay, about £17 and rather usefully this scope has 2 ways to mount the camera in the prime focus way first in the eyepiece using a T adapter for 1.25" telescope (available for about £10) or the telescope specific Celestron Nexstar 4 T adapter, about £15.
The Celestron adapter allows the camera to capture the image without mirrors and therefore the right way up, and as it bypasses the eyepiece mirror I'd recommend this way for the best image. Then it's just a case of pointing the telescope and focusing using the peaking of the Q.
Hopefully this helps, I'll take a picture of the setup next time I'm out.

This is Q attached to 1325mm f11, mirror lens in the form of Celestron Nexstar 4se. I've multiplied the focal length by 5.5 hence the focal length, as I understand this is the multiplication factor for a full frame equivalent , of course this may not be the correct focal length to show, I'm happy to take advice on this.

Can't bring myself to apologise for using the Q for shooting the moon, with focus peaking and light weight I find it great for this kind of shot.


1: Posidonius



2: Theophilus