Erm, John I think you'll find it's the same with the SMC-F
I have the SMC-F 100/2.8 macro. A very, very fine lens indeed.

As Peter says, there's no barrel clamp, but it has the same formula and focus limit. Not sure how it compares with the Sigma or Tamron. I've seen excellent results from the Tamron (personally I'd prefer Tamron over Sigma, but that's just my opinion).

Given the price hikes in new Pentax lenses, these are getting harder to find!

Matt

The D700 is 1/250 flash sync speed. Sorry Feeb, that isn't going to make a huge difference from 1/180 - it's not even 1 stop, actually around one third of a stop. Yes, the Nikon flash metering is almost certainly better than the K20D, as is its remote control ability... but then if you're using studio lighting you won't be using those features.

EDIT: And unlike the D700, the K20D has a true ISO100 - which will make more of a difference in outdoor shooting with flash than a 1/3rd sync speed difference

Like Nikon, Pentax have their own flash guns that support sync all the way to the top shutter speed

EDIT: I'm also puzzled by the dynamic range comments. Looking at dpreview they show the D700 as having 7.8Ev range at ISO200, while the K20D has more at 8.6Ev - so at low ISOs you should be able to pull more info out of the Pentax! Looking at the curves, it's definitely different at those ISOs. Certainly though the D700 has more at ISO3200 - 7.3 vs 5.8. The larger photosites are going to make some difference, but on paper it doesn't look like a huge margin. I'm not berating the comments made... just puzzled by what is actually the difference In some cases I'm sure psychology plays a part...

All the best though
Matt

That depends

TBH, I think you'll find that the "bounce" and stuff out of Nikon is largely down to the post production skills, rather than the camera. It'll be interesting to hear just how much of a jump you find it initially.

But that said, it certainly does depend what you're doing as a pro - even the D700 won't be suited to all types of pro photography

Certainly, the D700 is a mighty fine camera and should be able to produce the goods in capable hands.

I hope you find what you're looking for in it... and if you can spare a moment to come back and let us know your progress that would be helpful

Matt

Personally I wouldn't use RSS feeds.
Slightly OT, one thing though I really could do with is an improvement to the "New Posts" page.

If I've been away for a while there can be loads and loads of pages to roam through - often more than I can handle in one sitting Either some way of bookmarking the current set (i.e. an "I haven't finished" link), or a way of finding all posts that have been updated since a certain date.

Either of those options would be hugely useful

Matt

Ahhh - now that's a huge improvement
Perhaps a tad close to the edges of the frame (would be a problem if physically printing and mounting), but otherwise looks good to me.
Matt

I doubt you will get any company to test (Metz or Pentax)

As Graham says, you can:
* Set "A" on the flash
* Set "M" on the camera
* Set the camera to, say, f/8
* Set the flash to f/8
* Set the flash to the same ISO as the camera

As long as the K20D metering doesn't show overexposure, you should be fine
Matt

Malcolm,
I have the K20D and am pretty shortsighted (obviously wear specs!). When I use the O-ME53 I find I can see the whole viewfinder by moving my eye fractionally higher - so it's a physical movement of the camera or head.

Generally it's not too much bother, but I've recently gone back to not using the O-ME53 - mostly because in the rain the eyecup can become fogged.

...slightly OT... held a K7 yesterday and the viewfinder was a big "wow"! Shouldn't have held it, 'cause now I want one

Matt

Sorry Nathan - doesn't do it for me either
My initial impressions are: my eye is drawn to the right green stem first, back to the part of a stem on the left, then to the centre of the flower. From there, it's annoying that the petals have been cropped as I can't see the whole thing!

But that's just my view...
Matt

Jackie,
I use the Lee Foundation holder with Cokin Z-Pro filters
The Lee holder is a lovely piece of engineering - better than the Cokin IMHO.

When I use P sized filters I use a mix of Hitec, Cokin and others.

The other thing to watch with the Z-Pro/Lee filters is the size of the grad. They are designed to work with BIG lenses, so if you stick them on a 49mm filter thread you're going to get a much softer grad than you might want. The Cokin Z-Pro grad is really a bit too soft to be controllable when using even 67mm or less filter sizes (NOTE: That's not a scientific test, just from experience).

I almost steer back to the P-size filters for portability (the Z-Pro are big things!), and use multiple exposures on a tripod for anything that needs it. FWIW, I have a hacked up P-size Cokin holder that works pretty well even at 12mm on the DA12-24. Only the slightest vignetting appears if the filter isn't square (ie trying to get an angled ND grad).

The other thing is that the Z-Pro filters are expensive if you scratch them I've had a go at polishing out some scuffs that I acquired with Kingfisher toothpaste Certainly helped... but I wouldn't have minded so much if it was a P-size that scratched

HTH!
Matt

Sounds very much like right brain activity It's related to intuition.
I read through "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" and found this very helpful indeed.

Actually in my work, although very left-side (analytical, systematic, linguistic) orientated, I do use the right-side a lot. In debugging code I find that my right side "sees" the answer first - particularly when dealing with complex time-related issues. I can't even vocalise what the problem is, but I know I can see it. It takes a little while to distill the information from the right side to the left side... and then I can say what's going on

Thanks for the reminder Ben - I do find I spend a long time in "left mode" with images when it should be more creative and right-mode

I'll try harder in future

Matt