I agree with you - the USP of the K-7 is to pack all of those features into a "small is beautiful" robust body. It's not for everyone, but if you're going to go for small and discrete, then stuffing a huge lens on the front kind of defeats the point.

I'd seriously consider the two lens WR kit to start with - just so that you have some good travel and weather resistant options without spending a load on DA* lenses.

After that, I'd supplement with a few well-chosen primes. Starting from scratch, if you want to go with the "one on the camera and a couple in your pockets" approach, I'd buy the DA Ltds - 21,35 and 70. Then I'd buy a secondhand fast 50 for portraits.

That would do to start with (and for airshows I think I'd add the Sigma Bigma into the mix as well as the Pentax lenses you mentioned).

I have the Tamron version of the 18-250, which is an extremely close relation of the Pentax lens (same optical formula although there is some debate as to whether Pentax used different lens coatings. Either way, I think the results from them are likely in reality to be indistinguishable).

It is better than it has any right to be.

At the wider end, sharpness and contrast are at least the match of the kit lens, possibly better (although it has more vignetting and distortion which can be corrected in post processing).

It keeps going very well until you get to medium telephoto lengths, but performance drops towards 250mm. At that point, the centre is sharp enough even "wide" (f6.3 = hardly wide!) open, but the borders less so and bokeh can be distracting.

Overall, it's a very handy lens and the only issue that people complain about frequently is "lens creep" - the lens telescopes out to its longest length when you are walking around, unless you use the transport lock switch - which is not exactly a major hardship.

If you can get one at a good price (I see that one may be available as per link above!) I don't think you'd go too far wrong.

I quite agree that any of the XX-300 lenses are likely to perform better than the 50-200 at the longest end, but I've been using the 50-200 WR and surprised at how decent it is. It's particularly good in the middle of its range, but I've deliberately tortured it by shooting at 200mm/f5.6 and found the results towards the centre of the frame to be "good enough". Obviously things get better when you stop down. Borders at long lengths aren't so great but I'm not convinced that's a big issue (depending upon your subject matter).

I made the opposite decision to some others here - I sold the 55-300 and kept the 50-200 WR. It's size coupled with weather-resistance makes it more useful. And as John has pointed out, the WR lenses are great for travel.

Thanks Tim. As I get used to extension tubes I'm starting to think that they are a very cost-effective and lightweight route into macro photography if you only do it occasionally. Mind you, attaching them to a lens as good as the 77 does help too!

Well nearly. After having recovered from a bout of stupidity about thinking of selling this lens a few days ago, it came out to play today, and just for a change I tried it with an extension tube. Here's some of the results, one from our local park, and a couple more of a resident in the sunflowers in our front garden:

Having just perused Ebay I'm prepared to go to £200 incl RM Special Delivery for this great Voigtlander lens - mint condition and barely more than half the cost of a new one.... Optically and mechanically, it'll give the 43 and 40 Ltds a good run for their money so this is an amazing opportunity!

Bump - mint Voigtlander Ultron still for sale with reduced price of £225 incl PayPal and UK Special Deliver postage. Given the price of this lens new (£370 + P&P) this is an absolute bargain.....

Last chance on these before I sell through other routes. Price reductions to now include PayPal fee and RM Special Delivery postage in the figures quoted above.

Cheers,

Jon

Same thing happened to me yesterday. I posted a 35-105 RM Special Delivery for Monday delivery, having declined the extra £2.50 to deliver on a Saturday - bit it got there today anyway!

Looks v impressive. I currently use Topaz Denoise 4, which works well but takes quite a while to process each image (around 1 minute). How fast is the new Lightroom at doing the noise processing? I'm tempted to consider moving on from PSE to Lightroom because you read so many glowing reports....