Thanks for that, it'll give the members here something to go on.

I myself have a *istD with grip and kit lens, but it's not available for £150.00 I'm afraid.

I think if you just use the lens outside, any static charge will dissipate naturally. Air conditioned and/or centrally heated homes generally have a drier atmosphere which aids the build up of static as it can't dissipate through the air.

Touching the front element of the lens in multiple places will probably be a fruitless exercise anyway. A lens pen has a plastic (insulating) barrel and is likely to be ineffective at dissipating any static charge. Rubbing with a cloth is more likely to produce more static electricity than remove it.

Yes, static can be transferred from one non-conductive surface to another, but it's best to have some control over which way it is transferred. Also, the charges on the two non-conductive surfaces can only be equalised by contact (rubbing), not wholly transferred.

That said, by holding the cloth, and if you yourself are grounded, the static may eventually dissipate from the lens surface to ground via the cloth and your own body.

Probably the best solution to your problem is just to use the lens outside.

Well I did say one way Don . . .
Touching the Kitchen sink/tap in my house wouldn't work. The sink is plastic/resin and all our water pipework is plastic and has no earth bonding anywhere. The cables are there, but nothing to attach them to.

How much is your friend's budget? Real figures please, "As little as possible" is no help.

If the lens is indeed electrically charged with static, there is only one way to dissipate it. Cloths, lens pens, etc will not dissipate an electrical charge.

The one and only way to equalise the electrical charge on the lens is to make an electrically conductive circuit between it, and ground.

One way to achieve this would be to remove your shoes and socks, go out side with the lens and stand on bare earth. Then remove the lens cap and touch the front element for a few seconds. Now you have a fingerprint to clean off, but the static will have discharged through your body. Now, the ground, you, and the lens, will all be at the same electrical potential.

This effort will all be useless however if your home is filled with artificial fibres, the generators of the static in the first place.

Perhaps the household also needs a new vacuum cleaner?

You could think of Lightroom as your digital darkroom where most of the work is done. I use Lightroom almost exclusively, and only use PS-CS5 for the really serious stuff, which is not very often.

If I had to choose which one to do without, it would definitely be PS-CS5. I couldn't be without Lightroom. There really isn't much that most photographers need that Lightroom can't deliver.

Lightroom is also a very good photograph management tool with it's keywording and rating/flagging options.

That's very unlikely Gwyn. The upper bird is a Red Kite, the lower bird is a Buzzard.

Apart from the colouring, the tail outline is a dead give-away.

Of course, we could be expecting a new breed. A Buzzite perhaps

Actually, Beacon Hill is part of Aston Rowant National Nature Reserve. The nearest post code I could get is for Hill Farm, Stokenchurch, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire HP14 3YJ. Set your Sat Nav to that, drive past, and look for this sign (Aston Rowant National Nature Reserve):

A really lovely series Dan.

There is another place you might try on a future occasion, and that's Beacon Hill Nature Reserve. It's a long time since I was there but it's a beautiful spot where in the past I've seen loads of Kites.

They do hang around Stokenchurch a lot too.

Perhaps if you'd offered it here for £75 (approx £85 minus ebay and Paypal fees), another happy Pentax User member could be enjoying the use of it by now.