That's a fantastic price, unless of course our "street price" turns out to be lower than expected!

Good luck with the new cameras and let's see some pictures soon?

Technically excellent and an interesting and different subject.

It might be a good idea to post a picture as an example of what you are shooting.

The 50mm f1.4 is ideal for low light, but it does depend on the subject. If the light is really poor manual focus might be better - focusing will certainly be critical as I assume you are using it with a wide aperture so you can hand hold.

Considering the price of the item, the new street price and the inconvenience potential, I would say £10 is a pretty good deal.

The dealer's wish to be helpful might evaporate somehwhat at that point! The £10 option seems rather more attractive....

Perhaps return it for a full refund and source it elsewhere? If that is fruitless, then it looks like the repair option may be the only one.

I think I might have at least a glance, otherwise if and when things improved I wouldn't know!

Very much less than is recorded on the sensor or film, but the key to that is just how we compress the dynamic range to fit within the limitations of our materials.

A colour slide has much more dynamic range than a print, and a monitor will have a similar advantage.

This does not negate what we do with HDR or any other technique as our challenge, often met, is to get all the information onto the final viewing media, just like we did in the darkroom when we dodged and burned our prints.

Fair point, although I'm referring to the new AP that arrives today for subscribers and is in the shops next Tuesday. It will be interesting to see if you think there's any improvement when you see it.

Not a dumb question at all.

The type of "HDR" where you use a single exposure and process three or more files from it is possible, from RAW or even from a JPEG, but there is a limit to how wide the dynamic range of the sensor is. You are not capturing all the information that comes through the lens, just about 6 or 7 stops of it.

True HDR needs more than three exposures, but certainly at least three. You would expose at the "correct" reading and also at one stop under and one stop over.

Personally I use 7 exposures, -3, -2, -1, 0, +1, +2, +3 which captures a huge dynamic range of about 13 stops. This is not possible without HDR. When these images are combined in Photomatix you get an enormous dynamic range. This suits church interiors, where the deepest shadows and the brightest windows can all be reproduced.

Of course overdone it looks awful, but with the right subject it can look superb. As you have already observed though, it's not for trees on a windy day!

The 50mm lens is liked by some as a portrait lens, the theory being that it gives a nice 75mm-equivalent, which is close to the "classic" 85mm lens used for that in film photography.

I wouldn't use a 50mm for flower photography as it doesn't focus quite close enough for small flowers.

I tend to use the 55-300mm for flowers these days, with a tripod. Sometimes the 16-45mm (18-55mm also would be OK) if I want a closer viewpoint.

I don't think this 50mm lens suits your photographic requirements - don't let it dishearten you but try another lens and reassure yourself when you get better results?