I sent you a PM and you replied. I think you should now be able to PM.

Pm sent. But I will also give way to Cuchulain as he seems interested in using the camera, whereas my interest is a little more mercenary.

From all I've read you can't really go wrong with the 50-135 though, good choice on the OP's part I reckon.

Very good Stu, that lens looks pretty good. Lovely dunnock shot, apart from the stick behind.

Good sky and comp in 1, and I love the movement in 4. Nice work.

Hmm it makes the top of the list! It does say that full AE settings are only available for Nikon, which is either out of date or incorrect info I presume?

Hefty had some great advice on this. The usual line is 'buy cheap, buy twice', but he correctly pointed out that grads often end up not being used much, so it might be an idea to buy cheap and cheerful to begin with, and then graduate (no pun intended) to higher quality ones if you get into it. The usual complaint with the cheap ones is that they have a slight color cast - this isn't really much of a problem on digital though. My kood ones seem ok, the holder is cheap and not so cheerful though. Doesn't matter for the amount of use it gets!

You definitely need square ones IMO.

My items tend to be around 100.00 or less, so it's less of a hit if they go missing, and the cost of me covering losses myself is more than offset by the standard insurance and the savings made by generally not having insurance. I would cover losses myself unless shipping overseas when I always tell the buyer 'at your own risk'. Especially Italy - buyers there are usually just grateful to have someone willing to ship to them.

Exactly, that is precisely why I use signed for (but don't bother with insurance on most things). Badly worded post - sorry!

Some fine shots there, thanks! How does the lens handle - does it feel good on the K7 or is it a bit heavy?