Steve, I saw one of these with a BIN price of £399 a while back. It didn't sell and was re-listed at £299 I think. It sold in a heart beat.

These are almost giveaway prices now. I won't be going any lower.

Lens now sold.

Both the FA100 Macro and FA135 are in the care of Royal Mail and will arrive at the new homes very soon.

Thanks to all.

You might be interested in this if you are after a high quality lens.

Last chance saloon for these items before whatever remains goes of to that shop in Watford High Street next Tuesday.

Prime lenses
SMCP-A 24mm 1:2.8 - £120
SMCP-K 50mm 1:1.2 - £220
SMCP-K 500mm 1:4.5 - £520

SLR 35mm bodies
Pentax MZ-6 + SMCP-FA 28-80mm + Battery Grip FG £75

Prices above include Royal Mail next day Special delivery to a UK address with insurance up to £500. If the 500mm lens is too heavy for RM to carry it, it'll be sent via courier.

Prices below exclude the cost of Royal Mail 2nd Class Recorded delivery to a UK address (about £2)

Sundry bits 'n bobs
2 x Pentax K-M42 adapter incl. release tool - £10 each
Pentax 49mm threaded screw on lens hood for 50/55mm - £10
Tokina filter kit - £10 see initial post for contents.

Postage to anywhere else will be at cost, minus the postage costs to a UK address.

Interesting read. Thanks Steve.

1885 - 1917 - they only just survived into the 20th century

This should help explain it all . . . and it's from over three years ago.

I can certainly understand the reason for your question, but like Terry, I can see no reason to force oneself to use manual exposure mode all of the time. At one time we had no choice, but those days are long gone.

Modern cameras have very sophisticated light measuring systems, and we pay a premium for it. DSLR's would be a lot cheaper without it.

So, I prefer to use some of the automation that I've paid for, Av mostly, and tweak it a bit using exposure compensation if it becomes necessary.

I set my ISO according to the available light, ISO 100 in normal daylight or indoors with flash, and up to ISO1600 indoors with no flash.

I'll then chose an aperture that produces the DOF I'm after, or that is appropriate to the scene. This is often arrived at by trial and error, mostly error.

I take an exposure, check the histogram, and adjust with exposure compensation until the histogram looks good. I don't worry about shutter speed in this scenario, the camera is clever enough to deal with it.

Of course, not every shot I take follows that procedure, but a high percentage certainly do.

Fully manual control really comes into its own when taking images in mixed lighting, flash and daylight for example. Aperture and shutter speed are then adjusted to produce the balance that you are trying to achieve.

My advice is to use Av mode for a while and use f8 as a default setting. Play around from there. If you go to a race track for instance, change to Tv mode and set a speed that is high enough to freeze the action.

On the K10/20D, you can even have TAv mode, shutter and aperture priority together, the camera sorts out the ISO to give a correct exposure.

There's lots to learn, and a lot of folk to learn from.

Lovely set Oggy. I like #2, the other snoozing duck, on one leg, and the mandarin is exquisite.