You will notice that the topic has been deleted, which is exactly what would happen here and does happen here when something dubious is posted.

However, in any event, I was really talking about the Reader gallery and the critiques posted, not the forums themselves. I don't usually have time to scan the EPZ forums.

To be fair, I've not yet seen anything on ePHOTOzine get ugly in any way. As long as everyone is civil and considerate, there should be no problem.

I'm very glad that this forum seems to be very civilised indeed.

On ePHOTOzine you can post a picture and then anyone can post comments, and you can reply to them. In effect, I would have thought this was a forum thread about each picture.

If you want to post a picture in this forum for comment, you can do that providing the image is already on the web to link to. Hit the Img tab above, enter the URL and then hit the Img* tab to close off the instruction.

I'm rather intrigued to know how accurate you think the replacement of the elements or groups would be. (And perhaps how accurate it needs to be). What about the amount of torque applied when re-tightening?

I only tried opening a lens once - a SMC Pentax-A 50mm f1.7 with a suddenly faulty diaphragm ring. Do watch those ball bearings, they roll a long way....

Very well put, Matt.

If I had felt there was any real quality issue, then I would have certainly explored RAW by now. As it is, I will be exploring it as an exercise as part of my beginners Photoshop presentations that I do for camera clubs.

The "nitty-gritty" is the final product, of course. When we enter competitions and the prints are side by side at A3 it's very clear that there is no difference in quality between JPEG users and RAW users, in fact some photographers using JPEG capture show clearly very superior work.

How can this be? I suspect the answer lies in the individual's expertise in Photoshop, which in many cases is a more significant factor than the difference between RAW and JPEG.

Unfortunately, this can't be demonstrated on a web site! But have a look at Sue's picture of a White Rose on EPZ. Super picture, JPEG, some nice PS CS2 manipulation, and a superb A3 print with lots of lovely delicate detail in highlights and shadows.

http://www.ephotozine.com/gallery/ulpics/77235_1133032845.jpg

Whilst it may well be true that RAW has more potential for quality, it would be unfair to say that the JPEG images from the *istD series are poor - in fact I would describe them as excellent.

I will get to trying out RAW capyure soon, but it's going to have to be pretty good to not just end up as a solution to a problem that doesn't exist....

I'll let you know how it goes

The driver was probably hiding round the corner, just waiting for George to go out. Then in he swooped with the Yellow Card before retreating back to the Hidden Headquarters to recount the tale over a few Root Beers.....

I know what you mean, Kimbo, but these days do we ever know what we are buying? Some Nikon film bodies are, I understand, made by Cosina. Some Rollei products were Samsung. Some Leica lenses were made by Minolta.....

As long as the specification and tolerances are determined by Pentax, I guess they don't need to make everything themselves. The purist in me disagrees with what I am saying, but the realist tells me that economies of scale and the very tight pricing in the marketplace make the sort of tie-ups we are discussing inevitable.

It looks very interesting, and the open acknowledgement that the lens has been developed jointly with Tokina is interesting too.

It makes it look very likely that this could apply to the 12-24mm as well.

If the quality is right, there's nothing amiss with such co-operation, it can only assist with costs and bring even more cutting edge products to us more quickly.

All can be K mount except the Lydith, which I have only ever seen as M42. Unless anyone knows differently.....