AHA, that's fixed it. Don't worry Clarky, since someone has just posted a pic taken with a Canon, my machine now has a new preferred target


ChrisA, part of me thinks that would be hysterical. Probably the part of me that is already thinking as if it is drunk, in preparation for my Birthday celebrations tomorrow, but a part of me none the less.

you weren't?

Damn, my weather control device is on the fritz again. Back to the drawing board!

I sold one of those 70-210s a couple of years ago for £70. Note that was before the Pentax price explosion on Ebay, lord knows what they go for now. If it's in good nick then that's an excelent deal.

If I use NR at all, I like to do it first, directly after RAW processing. Since the new version of UFRAW has built in NR I will sometimes use that.

I do it this way around because it keeps my NR settings predictable. The later stages of processing tend to amplify noise so make the settings you need variable. Resizing is the worst, since it actually changes the size of the noise and I find this degrades the performance of the NR system.


Saying that, with my K10D I rarely need to use NR at all unless shooting at at least ISO 800

Rubbish, Pentax themselves make a tripod which would hold it easily



Of course you will have to talk to Pentax Surveying rather than Pentax Photographic......

good grief I have an astro telescope which is more compact than that! It would be neat for setting yourself up in a bird hide or something though.

I would like to see a mid-priced (say ~£300) ~100-300 zoom which is reasonably sharp all the way out to 300mm.

Doesn't have to be fixed aperture, doesn't even have to be particularly fast variable (F4.5-5.6 would do for me), just so long as it actually performs beyond 200mm.

for first trys, very nice indeed.

I also especially like the Mill shot, Brill Windmill makes a great subject doesn't it?

given the difficulty in actually getting hold of a new one, I'd say they'd almost certainly be able to charge a premium rate. As we all know, a used lens is worth precisely what you can get for it.

2 points come to mind

1: My K10D also makes a very slight hum with the shutter open, SR or no SR. I think it is because even with SR off, the sensor mounting still has to activate in order to hold the sensor on station. It has always done this.

2: Even if there is no actuator on the lens, hitting the green button will cause the aperture actuator on the camera to descend. This makes a pronounced scratchy, squeeky noise. I would have thought you'd have heard it before, but you may always have been concentrating too hard on the shot to notice. It's amazing what one can miss when concentrating.

fingers crossed that's all it is!