It may have something to do with the extending zoom mechanism which the 50-135 doesn't have.

I got my DA*16-50 out to take some photos this afternoon and was very worried to find that the SDM motor was not working at all. I had only used it two days before to take a few shots around Leeds and it had worked fine all day long then.

I did test it for a good while... half pressed the shutter, fiddled with the AF button, changed the focus lever and switch and nothing happened. I did the same on the 2nd K10D body we have and it was exactly the same. I was starting to sort out sending it to Pentax to look at, it was all neatly packed away.

I decided I'd get it out and have an other look. This time I heard movement within the lens, the AF mechanism was moving extremely slowly and in a jumpy manner, hopping half a millimetre or so on the distance indicator. I got it to move all the way through the focus range once each way painfully slowly. The next time I got it to move it focused at a normal speed but making a squeaky noise as it did so. I have heard someone mention squeaky SDM previously with their 16-50 on DPR forums.

It seems to have returned to normal apart from the squeaky AF noise. Does anyone have any similar experiences or suggestions?

I am a little worried as my only other lens my 50-200 is non-functional as it won't focus any more. Images are very soft throughout the focus range (thing 85mm soft lens soft but completely missfocused) and it is completely out of focus when set near infinity on targets far away. Things are not going well...

Much better than the old site, a very good update. Would be good to have the checkout system updated as well.

By the way, the 18-250 pentax has the picture for the 55-300...

PVA, prit stick type stuff, superglue... Doesn't matter as long as it sticks...

BTW I have the seam at the back of the flash where it won't affect the image as there is an overlapped tab for the glue.

I used a dual layer bubble wrap with the flat side of the sheets against each other. You can use a single layer with the flat sheet inside or outside. There are a lot of ways to modify the light output, the more layers of wrapping the softer (and less powerful the light).

My girlfriend's uncle has both the soft and the clear lightsphere and swears by them. I have been looking at them for a while and just came up with a replacement that works just as well and costs about 2p.

I have been very pleased using the Gary Fong Lightspheres when I've borrowed them but I can't spend £50 on a cast piece of transparent plastic.

What you need:

Elastic Band
Bubble Wrap
Glue

Make a cylinder out of the bubble wrap and glue it together. Leave it to dry for a few minutes. Slide the elastic band over the top of the flash then place the now dry bubble cylinder over the top of the flash which has been rotated to the same 90 degree angle Gary Fong recommends. Move the elastic band over the cylinder and hey presto, lightsphere equivalent for 2p!

Sounds like Blue Peter...

Here is one I made earlier:




The great thing about this is you can also build a whole range of accessories go with it just as cheaply

PS. The contraption I made is very tall but you can roll it down to change the hight and how it diffuses the light.

I wish that were my kitchen I'm not fond of this house, nor the area it is in...

The bokeh with the 85mm F0.14 must be really shallow.

I'm sure someone will want to snap them up. They are supposed to be superb lenses. How much use have you gotten out of them?

The K10 or K10 are good jump up. My girlfriend used to shoot with a Fujifilm FinePix S20Pro and quite quickly took to the K10D.

The K10/K20 will function and feel quite close so it is just price and quality of the newer imaging technology in the 20.

A series Pentax lenses work quite well as they are automatic. M series and K series lenses are more complicated to use and the exposure is not always right (tend to underexpose).

The Pentax kit lens is actually really good to start with but prime lenses can bring out more creativity than a zoom lens. If you want some good primes then the FA35 and FA50 are held in high regard and are not too expensive and still available new. You can use them fully manual if you like but autofocus is very useful in some situations as it generally works much faster than focusing manually.

No idea who those two are...

Can't really see much detail at this size and the dark tones are much better when printed.