In certain lighting conditions, purple fringing is common to most DSLR's and has very little, if anything, to do with the lens.

This phenomenon is a function/limitation/inability of the DSLR's sensor to properly resove high contrast parts of the image. Given the same lighting conditions almost any lens would exhibit this to some degree.

CA is generally seen as a discolouration, displayed at an angle to the incident light hitting the lens. This is down to different colours taking slightly different paths through the lens's optics and they don't always arrive at the same place on the sensor. Much in the same way that a prism splits white light into it's component colours of the spectrum.

If you think of a lens as a complex series of complicated prisms which ideally should recompose the various colours and place them at their same origin at the sensor. Unfortunately it doesn't always get it right and cheaper lenses can get it wrong much more often.

Purple fringing differs in that it appears all round a particularly bright, or overexposed, high contrast area of the sensor.

It appears that the latter is the case with the OP's flash reflection of his model's pupil. The green cast he mentions may well be CA, but the purple (blue) fringing seems to me to be just that, fringing.

Irrespective of what the future may hold now that Pentax is part of Hoya. It's entirely possible that Pentax have been waiting for other manufacturers to 'show their cards' before committing a shed load of money to manufacture a product that may have no future.

Realistically, are pro's really going to switch from their 'blads with Phase One digital backs, to Pentax's first MF offering? Personally, I doubt it.

Competition is always healthy, mostly for the consumer. It'd be no fun at all watching a one horse race.

I lasted 1 minute 23 secs. The video is far too 'busy' for me. Very distracting and certainly not watchable for 4 minutes and should carry a health warning for epileptics.

I use a lens hood with every lens, sunny or not. At the very least it gives the lens some protection from fingerprints etc.

Spot on. I like it.

Stunning subject and very nice composition. It looks a little underexposed and perhaps a tad too soft/unsharp, but that's personal preference.

Excellent first attempt with your K10D.

Is that perhaps a dust particle stuck to your sensor?

If you look at the . . . . .

. . . . . only kidding, looks great.

Have you tried a different card?

That article also confirms another suspicion that I haad, that 500ma isn't enough current to drive the camera.

In general electronic terms, a device that is supplied with a lower voltage than that for which it was designed may function perfectly well. This assumes that enough current (demanded by the device) can be supplied whilst the lower voltage is sustained. It also depends on how much lower the supply voltage is. With a new set of alkaline batteries installed, the camera is powered from a 6 volt supply (4 x 1.5 volts per cell). With NiMh rechargeables, the voltage is likely to be less than 6 volts.

Supplying a higher voltage is courting disaster. Don't do it.

I do not recommend, in fact I suggest you do not, connect anything other than the Pentax power supply to your camera.

You have to ask yourself only one question before you connect a 'mickey mouse' power supply to your camera, and that is, can I afford to destroy the camera?

I'm betting you paid less than a fiver for your power supply. How much would it cost to replace the camera if/when you destroy it?

Regards,