1. Tripod - definitely useful to have one although I don't personally use one all that often. A cable release is useful if you do get a tripod but they can be picked up cheap from Ebay.

2. Raw or Jpeg - I use both, raw when lighting conditions are difficult or I want the very best quality, jpeg when I'm going to be taking lots of pictures e.g. on holiday. For your Costa Rica trip it'd probably better to use jpeg and take more shots.

3. I don't mind taking my K10D (and non weather sealed lenses) out in the wet etc. and haven't found a need for any specific cleaning kit or products.

4. Circular polariser for certain and ND graduate filters are still useful with digital. I don't use UV filters - the only other filter I do use is for infra-red.

P.S. I also like that shot - I think it's a very pleasing composition.

I use 'P' mode sometimes on my K10D and I also did on my Z1p - I found that with the program mode set to DOF it very often matched the results I'd have picked had I been using aperture priority, which is the mode I use most often.

I don't see how the 'P' mode could be the problem in this case because whatever the program line was set for it still wouldn't have picked settings that produced a grossly underexposed result. The only reasons I can see for that happening were if the camera were in manual mode and the user hadn't noticed, or if the camera was expecting the flash to fire and it didn't. Either that or the cameras broken or the user didn't take the lens cap off...

I've used my K10D & *istDS in lots of difficult indoor lighting conditions and never had a problem - shooting raw means you can leave sorting out the white balance 'til later anyway (especially if like me you're more interested in the results looking nice than being 100% accurate). The auto white-balance on the K10D does seem more effective than that on the *istDS though.

Thanks for the updates folks.

The B&S place in Edinburgh is quite close to our new office so that will be a convenient option.

7-day shop looks pretty cheap for film so that's sorted as well.

Not specifically a Pentax medium format question however where is recommended for the purchase of 120 films these days, and also for D&P? For the latter I'm not looking for professional labs as I'm just playing around with a couple of old cameras at the moment. Somewhere that also provided a reasonably priced scanning service as part of their D&P package would also be useful.

There is something peaceful and relaxing about that image - very nice.

Like many others I also hate pop-ups - as soon as a pop-up attempts to fire I leave the site and don't come back.