I have an older (1993 vintage) Tokina 28-70 ATX f2.8, Which is simply beautiful. I can't fault it. If you can afford it, try for one of these or a Sigma equivalent.

Regards

Thanks for the suggestions, chaps. Hopefully the one I bought from a fellow site member will be winging its way here this week from good old England. I'll post a pic or two, if the results are good enough.

Regards

So what would a K20D be worth then? And a Sigma 10-20??
Regards,
Sam-joseph

I reckon at least one of them is a clitoris, whatever the hell that is.
Or a Vegemite sandwich. I dunno. I've had a few reds, so they all look the same to me....

I have an X70,and have mixed feelings about it. Firstly, it's got an awful battery life. If you use it as a travel camera, take the charger with you and charge every night. The battery itself is quite small (about 1/3rd the size of the Li-ion in the wife's Sony A200.)
Zoom is a bit hit and miss. With such a long zoom range, it's easy to overshoot your ideal focal length. I always use the viewfinder to compose the shot. This one, as usual, is electronic and not bad. Wouldn't it be great though, to have an optical viewfinder on one these??
Zoom stabilisation is impressive to say the least. Results seem pretty good, but given the choice, I'd take a picture with my K100D Super any day.

Bloody hell,
That one's on my wish list, Clarky! If only I hadn't just sent off about $500 for a Tokina 80-400, I'd be interested. You couldn't hold it for about six months for me, could you??
sam-joseph,
Newcastle, NSW

Has anyone got a Tokina 80-400 kicking around?? Must be in usable condition, prefer series 2, but what the hell, beggars can't be choosers.Regards.

Thanks for the tip. I'm currently using a Sigma 70-300 APO, which is pretty good, but often I find I'm cropping a fair bit out of the photos. A Tokina 80-400 in Pentax mount would be great - (are you listening Mr. Tokina?), but unfortunately hard to come by. I'll take a look at the 120-400.
Thanks.

I have few boxes, but by golly that PZ1 box brings back memories. I rem ember trying my Tokina AT-X 28-70 f2.8 zoom on a PZ-1 in a London camera shop in about 1992. I then put the lens back on my trusty P30-T and left the store thinking, ïf it wasn't for this travelling thing, I'd have that lens". Anyway, now I'm settled in Australia, with kids, mortgage, dog and the travelling days are a lifetime ago. Just a thought. Plenty of blokes on this site have very expensive lenses. You don't need the fastest telephoto lens to get a great result. Take your 18-55 standard zoom out and use it!! Don't sweat about high tech. Most of the truly geat pictures had no planning, just luck. Power to Average Joe!!

Just a general question. Is the Bigma 50-500 any good for kid's soccer photos?? Is it fast enough at 400mm in bright conditions, or am I better off with a 300mm telephoto and teleconverter? I'm using a K100D super (6MP),So the question is, is it better to use a faster lens, or a higher MP camera and crop later?ie, a K200, or k20d (10MP).