I was quite an early adopter of digital and gave up on film pretty much overnight, then last year I bought my Pentax MX and started shooting film again (but with the majority still being digital). This last week I've shot a roll of 35mm film and two rolls of 120 film!

The moral is, don't give up on film just yet Aiki - sometimes it's quite nice to go out knowing you can only shoot 12 (or 24 or 36) photos that day so you have to make them good ones!

I'm very into square crops as a rule but in this case I think Martin's letterbox crop works perfectly - lovely colours and textures Aiki!

To be honest, since making a (limited) return to film I've found I much prefer Fuji films to the equivalent Kodaks, and from what I've noticed as I look at the work of others it seems I'm in the majority (not including b&w where Ilford still appears to reign supreme).

With a much smaller market it was rather inevitable that we'd end up with less choice and Fuji are still investing R&D in new emulsions; Kodak were resting on their laurels somewhat.

If I was in charge of Kodak I'd concentrate on easy-to-use digicams and flog the US of A heritage for all it was worth; America's a huge market and one that's easily swayed by a little patriotism - I'm sure if they made a "Digital Brownie" with an individual look and a few novel features they could have an iPod on their hands, I think it's probably too late for the film division though.

Nothing lasts forever...

Sounds good, you send me a wad of cash and I'll forward you details of how the scam works...

Yes it is.

Not if it's your own sister and you'd spent most of your teenage years keeping your mates away from the house...

Mine changes on a daily basis but I could probably get away with:

Pentax DA12-24
Pentax FA43 Ltd
Pentax FA77 Ltd
Zeiss Sonnar 135

That'd be the main four (well, they already are actually) and as a fifth I'd take the DA18-55 as a walkabout/do-anything/not-strictly-waterproof-but-not-too-bothered-about-it-getting-wet lens. Add in a 2x TC and some macro tubes for the Sonnar and there's not much I can't cover.

Although the quality of the glass in a filter plays a part it's not the most important one - that honour goes to the coatings in use.

Cheap filters are often uncoated or single coated which means they'll produce glare, false shadows, lack of contrast, etc on your final image. Your Pentax lenses employ the SMC coatings which are generally regarded as being some of the very best in the business, but if you place a cheap filter in front of them then all that hard work is effectively undone.

Hoya and B+W use the best coatings for their filters which should be as good as the coatings on your lens, hence if you don't want to see a reduction in quality then those are the ones to stick with. They're not the cheapest but like everything else in life you get what you pay for...

The OP singled yours out as a "helpful" comment. When you start a thread you get the option to highlight others' posts on it.

I'd have to agree with gartmore, the entire image taking process will only be as good as its weakest element - if you have a nice camera and a nice lens then a cheap filter will only drag it down.

Why not buy one nice filter in the larger (67mm) size and then use a 52>67 step-up ring to allow it to fit on the other lens too?

I personally love my MX - a superb film camera but it's also all-manual which could be a little intimidating if you're new to photography in general.

If you'd like a film camera that will allow you to do things "automatically" while your confidence builds then I'd look at something more recent like the MZ-3, MZ-5, MZ-6 or MZ-7. The latter two (6 + 7) sacrifice a few "pro" features but add scene modes for a shooting experience more like the one you get from your K-m.

With film cameras being so cheap these days (except the LX and MZ-S) you could probably buy a dozen for the price of a half-reasonable lens and give them all a run out to see which you prefer!