It's really up to you to review the market and see what fills your requirements.

Pro shooters, I presume meaning those who make money from their photography, then yes, there are plenty of Pentax pro shooters.

There are plenty of flash trigger systems that work with Pentax cameras, so if you're in the UK then the upcoming Focus on Imaging exhibition will be an ideal opportunity to look and compare.

I think it's very safe to assume that in general I gave up on independent manufacturers a long time ago!

There are exceptions though.

Probably, but we never noticed because of the delay between shooting and seeing the results. It would go down as user error.

In the case of the Adapter K I have a suspicion (but no proof) that this might have been a combination of two factors.

The first is the currency movement and the general price rise. The second may be that these items are made in batches that sometimes last a long time. What happens then is you find your manufacturer has put up the cost, or indeed is out of business so an alternative has to be sourced.

I've seen this happen before in an area where I was privy to the margins and costs and the final customer of course won't believe it's genuine.

But the choice may be either discontinue the item or put it out for sale at a huge price rise. Which is the best option? Probably a loser either way, but at least you can still buy the item.

Elements without a doubt - you'll have everything you'll probably ever need there for little more than £50 or so.

Trim the language please, stars don't help.

A lot of supposition and assumption there nass!

One factor that you haven't considered is the date of ordering. Some countries will have had good stocks before a currency shift, others may be caught out. Some will have different import tariffs. Some will have different marketing structures. Some will have different volumes so different purchase prices.

Unless we were actually in the businesses then we wouldn't know. Even those that sell may not know, as they may not have access to the details of the actual margins.

What I do know is that it's not that simple when we have no idea of a company's costs and how much margin they need to break even.

That's fantastic, just the sort of place I love to stumble across. It isn't even necessary to know what it was used for or when, it's just great to see it and soak up the atmosphere.

The fact is that we can only surmise and we don't know some of the things being presented as facts.

Supply and demand will eventually normalise the prices at a level that is satisfactory to the market. There is a lot of evidence that this has already happened, although the 12-24mm still remains an expensive lens, just like any other marque 12-24mm or similar.

Yes, and Pentax were applauded for putting f22 settings on the new lenses and at least giving photographers the option. Most others, bayonet or screw fit, were still stopping at f16.

According to Photo Technique at the time, the Vivitar is an exceptional macro lens.