i'm not interested in the lens, but i'm still tempted to buy it to sell it one at that price!

hmm. i seem to lose infinity focus with my 35mm da limited when using it. that's a bit worrying. anyone else have this combination to see whether i have something wrong?

200/2.8 seems fine at longer distances.

i can't see why it doesn't act the same with both lenses.

woohoo! my 1.7x af adapter is here.

first tests on the 200/2.8 show that it is still great one stop down.

now, to hunt down a 300/4 smc-a.

what i heard a while ago was end of october/start of november for first shipments. so the amazon dates are still in line with this.

sorry if i seemed a bit brash. it's just that i do want a bit of extra speed on the lens for the 1.7x af converter to kick in, which means i'm looking at f/4.5 and faster.

i reckon i'm going to try and hunt down a good deal on the 300/4 a-series. the 300/2.8 a* is a bit heavy for me.

thanks all for the tips!

hey stu and mike,

thanks for the suggestions. the thing is that i am actually a little bit fussy, and have a budget to look at something more expensive, but want to avoid looking at a 300/4 da* since the af would be a waste of money since i'd only use it with the 1.7x tc.

the 300/4 takumar has too much fringing for my liking. i understand after a bit more research that i have to look at newer glass that has the ed elements to counter this. i reckon that means that that i'm looking at the autofocus stuff out there.

the tokina, while probably a great piece of glass, won't autofocus with a 1.7x af.

i'm being pretty fussy here. i apologise for dismissing lots of your suggestions straight away, and perhaps not having explained what i was after clearly in my first post.

i might have to try and track down a well-priced 300/4.5 fa*, is my conclusion. it won't be cheap, but it'll stil be an exceptionally high quality and portable rig...

thanks for the quick reply, Matt.

i already have the 200/2.8 da*, so i'm pretty sorted with regards to that. i wanted mega reach for birding.

i'll just save the pennies for a decent 300mm.

thanks for the advice!

hi all,

i'm soon to be a happy owner of a 1.7x af tc, which i managed to source through the other forum. i'd like to get a decent 300mm piece of glass to couple it to, one that will give a compact 510mm set up with decent iq, and will couple with my 200/2.8 beautifully as a wildlife set-up.

any ideas? i looked at smc-a 300/4s, and they are really expensive. i thought that i might as well get the 300/4.5 instead of it at those kinds of prices. the old smc 300/4 has really pronounced longitudinal ca, so i'm going to say no to it.

i'm quite new to pentax, so i don't really know all the options so well, and appreciate any advice you might have.

cheers!

the k20 is the budget-minded option for what you want, and a very capable body.

the extra money you save by going that way will go a good way towards buying more limiteds.

also, strongly consider buying second hand on this forum—it could save you a ton of money. i wish i did this instead of buying new.

i am an lr3 user, and am generally happy with it.

photoshop offers much more than just more advanced healing and cloning. the ability to work with layers and do localised adjustments is much more advanced, and layering and stitching is possible. so hdr and panorama stuff becomes much easier.

the new version of elements is looking like a very good complement to lr3.

BUT, as said by others, lr3 is what i use for about 95% of my work. the odd trip to viveza is sometimes called for (wondrous piece of software, but expensive).