Seems just a tad dark to me Howard. But they are nice shots of a lovely bird.

I dont remember Jays when I was a kid, and 20 years of living in London I never saw one. Now we have moved out of London we get jays in the garden a lot, they seem very prolific this year, and what wonderful birds they are.

I must set aside a day to photograph them.

Black and white does not feature too much in the Pentax photo Gallery , so I was pleased to get this accepted recently.

This was taken outside the ice cream shop at Sissinghurst in Kent. K10D and my recently acquired DA16-50mm 2.8. This is fast becoming a favourite lens

Any comments welcome.

Simon

With an "A" lens you should leave it in the "A" position and use the camera wheel to set the aperture. You will not be able to use all the auto exposure settings otherwise. Also leave the lens on "A" all the time, it prevents any malfunction of the aperture ring.

You can use the DOF scales, but if I remember correctly, on a crop sensor the advice is to set the aperture one stop slower than the scale indicates. So if you set the infinity mark to the f11 marker on the DOF scale, you should use f16 to take the shot.

I might have remembered that last bit incorrectly, so hopefully someone else will chime in if I am wrong.

Excellent shots Ralf. Number 3 is my favourite.

.......me too

DS and K10 take the same screen

I do have a split-prism screen on my K10

The simple answer Howard is so that you dont realise how inaccurate AF can be.

Get a split-prism from ebay (from China). I did and it is perfect. Not dificult to fit either, I will happily talk you through it. The only thing you will lose is the accuracy of spot metering.

Amin

You should have just taken the second three lenses and let them worry about selling the balance?

Very nice portrait. I love the lighting.