looking at the price for the 55-300 HD WR I could see this 135-380 being about £850?

can't see it being more than that, otherwise it puts it up against the bigma

frankly I couldn't care less if the lens caters to full frame or not. I don't need full frame and TBH the 1.5 crop the APS-C sensor gets me means I don't have to pay stupid amounts of money for FF lenses with the same reach.

I'm an airshow person and lugging the Bigma around is quite enough as it is. So a lean 135-400 has tons of appeal. (bearing in mind the Sigma 120-400 is nearly as heavy as the Bigma is!) I have had the DA L 55-300 and while it hunted sometimes it would produce some stunning shots on a good day.

so the near release of a 135-400 + a TC is welcome news

I'm not into the whys and wherefores when it comes to lens design, but how come 380mm? isn't that a bit of an odd size to be the top end? why not 400? isn't that the more usual thing, buyers tend to like round numbers

well I was hoping for it to go out to 400mm but at 135-380 pentax are finally providing an alternative to Sigma in this area. also, the WR will be a welcome feature after being at a few wet Duxford airshows in the last few years.

I have got covers etc, but the WR will be most welcome.

pair it with a new WR TC that will be a sweet piece of kit. Get the image quality right and they have my pennies already seeing as Tamron won't do their 150-600 in K Mount.

the only other alternative I was looking at was springing for a Sigma DA100-300 (if I could ever find one) and pair it with a sigma 1.5x or 2x TC but this might have just taken care of that proposition.

do we have any other specs on this yet? where is the source of this news? Also, what is the likelihood this would approach the Sigma 100-300 F4 EX DG or Pentax DA 60-250 in image quality?

Predictions on Price anyone?

I sent them a nagging email too but got the standard PR 'thank you for your query, no we have no plans to release them in Pentax Mount.'

Why doesn't pentax just pony up the cash, stick a red ring on it, apply their own coating and a rubber o ring and do it in K mount? they've rebadged tamron before. makes perfect sense to me.

ticks me off that they are just taking existing lenses, adding a new coating and a few other pieces and lofting them out at higher prices when they aren't plugging the gaps in the lens lineup.

all very well saying this new stuff is coming, but what about a 100-400 and some kind of date for that?

My other half is hankering to take photos the old fashioned way. with film.

now while she's looking at really old fashioned fixed lens camera bodies, the old style vertical with two lens built in stuff, I'm trying to persuade her to go for pentax,

for a start we can share old lenses and I've got a 50mm M 1.4 she can use for starters.

but I know nothig about pentax film bodies. what's a good one to get?

there happens to be a camera shop in leeds that is selling a number of different pentax camera bodies for £60 down plus has a nice selection of lenses. but I don't know anything about the bodies.

to answer the questions, no I wasn't a left eye shooter.

what I've found with this technique is by using my left eye, my nose mashes into the pad of my right thumb gripping the camera, so straight away I have an extra thing to press against and hold steady.

I don't know so much about having a swivel neck but I am quite broad shouldered which does help. Also, doing it without the grip attached to the camera body makes it a bit difficult to get your shoulder to the camera.

this is what my rig looks like.




I came across the hama shoulder mount quite by chance and snagged it for £20 on ebay last summer.

link

came across something other people might find useful.

I'd not been happy lately with how I've been standing when shooting and I was starting to feel that technique was playing a big part in the lack of keepers I was getting. sometimes I get a shot bang on and then the next one was lacking.

then I did a bit of looking online, came across this video and bingo, big improvement. two samples attached showing the difference.

Both are iso 3200 with very slow shutter speed and about F4 or 5 on the 18-55 WR lens on the K3 body. low shutter speed NR is turned on and shake reduction is turned on too.

First shot is with my normal techinque. As you can see, very prone to shake due to exposure times. The second shot, much crisper and more solid.

Seconded mike. If random would release that in a Pentax mount it would be sweet

I beg to differ. I can get a k3 with grip mounted on 50-500 sigma with the hood extended in a think tank 30 v2 version of the holster. It is a snug fit I grant you. So if can get that in the 30, then the bigger 50 should be a doddle