Congratulations!

I've been meaning to give this a go myself, really must get round to it this year. Would the Agfa tank you bought take 120 film as that's what I'd be primarily developing?

1) Weather sealing
2) SDM motors
3) Quality of plastic used in mouldings
4) SMC coating process (still the best in the business)
5) Economies of scale. Tokina sell the same lens in several mounts and (due to the size of the market for Canon and Nikon compared to Pentax) probably sell many, many times more than Pentax do.

These lenses are the same in so far as they share an optical formula - that's it. There are no common parts or manufacturing processes so they can't be subjected to a straight comparison to calculate price.

There sure is! Not exactly a budget item though...

I've seen current Pentax Japan pricelists that show several FA lenses still in production to order, as well as the A50/1.2.

Most are the more esoteric lenses for which there is no DA equivalent (FA*600/4 etc), some are widely available (FA31/43/77 Ltd) and some are the more mundane (FA80-320 etc) which I guess are there to service those still using film cameras.

At any given time on eBay you'll find Far East sellers with stocks of A50/1.2's brand new - I've had my finger hover over the Buy-It-Now button many times but have so far resisited...

Probably one of the contacts has come away internally. Fixable but it'd probably cost as much to mend as a working example would be worth anyway.

If it were me I'd stick it on eBay anyway and just highlight the defect - I've no doubt you'll still get quite a reasonable price for it as-is.

Unlike you to pick up a dud Clarky...

It depends on whether your father is interested in photography or not; by which I mean the E-series Optios offer basic point-n-shoot operation without manual overrides for any form of creative control.

They can turn out reasonably nice pictures (I bought one last year for my sister) but I'd only recommend them to somebody who has no interest in photography and just wants something to take snapshots with.

I'm sure the price is fine.

I've got the 77mm and as a result have never tried the 70mm, but from what I've seen the DA70 is capable of very nice results indeed. I wouldn't swap if offered though if that helps...

Take the lens off and shine a torch through it - that should highlight where any dust lies. A spot as big as that should be fairly obvious.

Selenium meters aren't as sensitive to low light as the more modern designs are (and of course they can't do flash), but having said that I use an Ikophot selenium meter with my Rolleicord and I've not had any cause for complaint. You can pick them up dirt cheap (~£10-20 for a minty one) and I find it a very nice meter to use (better than any of the various Westons I've had pass through my hands).

If you're thinking of investing for the future (flash work) I'd say have a look at second hand Minolta models in the £120 range. They'll be a few years old by now but they're pretty much bullet proof and will probably still outlast anything you'd buy new at that price point.

Unfortunately I'm not that suprised - if it'd had the 58/2 you could have added quite a chunk onto that price.

Oh well, I'll keep scouring the camera fairs...