PM sent.

Thanks for the reassurance. I thought that the word 'clamp' would lock the focus.
I shall now get out and give it a good workout with confidence!

Hi
Just got a 100mm macro and I'm not sure if all is well.

When the lens is manually focused to the stop, the focus collar seems to continue to revolve. Is this normal.

When I tried the clamp, the camera switches to manual focus ok but the focus collar still changes the focus. Is this how it is supposed to work?

I thought it was faulty and took it back. I tried a second lense but that operated exactly the same just the same. Decided I needed some expert help so came to the forum!

Thanks. I hadn't found the pentax that price, only the samsung.

I am looking to buy a macro lense and have seen the price of the pentax 100mm climb. I have also seen the sumsung 100mm lens at what seems like bargan prices.

I believe they are the same lens, just dressed differently. Is this true?

Anyone have any experience of the samsung?

Just to pick up the thread again...
I happened to call in a Jessops the other day. I wandered around the shop and was eventually asked if I could be helped.

Thinking of some of the crazy things they have been doing recently, grips for £20 and so on, i said to the chap i was looking for Pentax. Secretly wondering if they had just found an old LTD in the stockroom and had just put it in the bargain bin for a fiver.

This chap was older and seemed more knowledgeable than usual. He didn't run down pentax, as other Jessops people have before when I have asked where the Pentax stand is. He told me that unfortuatly Jesspos had fallen out with Pentax over a deal on an exclusive model that Pentax had agreed to and then supplyed to other retailers. Jessops got the hump and the rest is history.

Don't know if this is news, true or not but this chap seemed quite sure of the history.

I look at photography as both an art and a craft.

The craft is the technical side that gets the image the artist is trying to achive. Using preset modes on the camera allows the artist to bypass the requirement for any technical knowledge and get the result they wanted to achive without the need to understand the craft, or does it?

The computer in a modern camera can only follow instructions that have been programed in by the designer. Agreed the variety of modes and other clever bits they add in can do a lot to improve the images that are recorded but there is a limit to the variety that automation can achive. Also the cameras have no capacity for original thought!

With knowledge of the craft, and kit that allows us to use that knowledge, the artist in us is able to create images that go beyond the confines of the camera 'mode'. It allows me to attempt to create the image I have in my head as an artist, using the craft to create the image. I'm not always succesful, i'm still learning my craft and probably always will be, but the reward is when it all works. That is the whole point. That is why photography is an art as well as a craft and both are interdependant.

There are times when I just want to record a time, place, event and then I am quite likely to switch to Green. Even then the artist in me starts to visualise things differently and the artist wakes up the craftsman to get the image the artist wants, not what the camera designer thinks I may want. After all the designer doesen't even know me, probably doesen't speak my language and certainly hasen't read my mind!

Thanks for finding the videos all, I know now that I have some saving to do!

Ordered about 2.00pm yesterday, arrived 2.00pm today! Of course I was at work and had to go to the carrier to get it!! Fast and free postage, I spotted the battery at the same time.

Only problem is I am still waiting for Pentax to return the camera. Four weeks now!

Well, I have not had the camera for over a month.

Still waiting for Pentax to fix and return. If it is not back to the shop (T4 Cameras Newbury) by the weekend I shall be calling in to Slough next week to ask them what they are playing at!