Non Digital Lenses on a DSLR

[auscop]

Hi, As you can tell I am new to this forum, there seems to be a lot of knowledge to be gained from reading these pages. I am looking at buying the Pentax *ist DS, I currently own a 35mm Pentax auto-focus that has two Sigma lenses, a 70-300mm and 28-80 mm.
My question is..... What will I gain from buy the camera with new digital lenses, is there any features/quality I will lose by keeping my old lenses (approx 3 yrs old). Also what is the opinion of the quality between Sigma and Pentax lenses is it worth spending a few extra buck to go Pentax all the way..

Thanks in advance for the advise and I apologise if this has already been covered in another post...

[peted56]

G'day mate,

Great choice on camera, I am biased of course as I have one. You may have to specially order the Pentax lenses, unfortuneately CR Kennedy the people that import the Pentax cameras here in Aust make more on the Sigma lenses so thats what they bring in, thats the end of my rant.

The basic kit Pentax lenses are a little better than the kit Sigma lenses, with what you already have I would buy the body with probably a 18-50mm or maybe a 18-125mm, it may actually be just as cheap to buy a complete kit with the lenses. The lenses that you have will work fine they will however effectively be 1.5 times what the label says.

Are you buying them in Alice Springs or mail ordering them, if you can possibly do so get an extended warranty, I added another 3 years to mine so that I have a 4 year warranty.

Cheers.

Pete D
Canberra

[auscop]

G'Day Pete,
Thanks for the info, at the moment I plan on buying the base with a 1 Gig card. I will use my lenses that I currently have and if I don't like them then I can later on buy the others. I will NOT be buying the camera in Alice, they rip you off here completely. I have been quoted, $AU1400 just for the base, so far online I have found it for $AU1180 which I am gathering is not too bad. I talked to someone the other night in the pub and he said that the non digital lenses may not shoot as well in the dark, I guess I will wait and see. Thanks again.

Austin

[peted56]

Your mate is sort of right, the kit lenses will have higher F stop settings and will not perform quite as well as more expensive lenses with smaller F stop settings.

From what I have seen though most of the currently available D-SLR kits come with quite reasonable lenses, I certainly would spend the small amount extra at the time I bought the camera and get something like an 18-50mm, if you buy it with the kit it will cost very little.

Cheers.

Pete

[Franglais]

Hi, As you can tell I am new to this forum, there seems to be a lot of knowledge to be gained from reading these pages. I am looking at buying the Pentax *ist DS, I currently own a 35mm Pentax auto-focus that has two Sigma lenses, a 70-300mm and 28-80 mm.
My question is..... What will I gain from buy the camera with new digital lenses, is there any features/quality I will lose by keeping my old lenses (approx 3 yrs old). Also what is the opinion of the quality between Sigma and Pentax lenses is it worth spending a few extra buck to go Pentax all the way..

Thanks in advance for the advise and I apologise if this has already been covered in another post...

This month's Reponse Photo (French magazine) has a test of zoom lenses for the Canon EOS 20D. This is a particularly demanding camera for lenses because the pixels are so small. Just looking at image quality, from best to worse:

36/40: Tamron 28-75 f2.8 (optimised)
35/40: Tamron 17-35 f2.8-f4 (optimised)
33/40: Canon 18-55 kit lens (digital)
32/40: Sigma 17-35 f2.8-f4 (optimised) Canon 17-40 f4 (film) Sigma 18-50 f2.8 (digital)
31/40: Canon 17-85 f4-f5.6 (digital)
30/40: Sigma 18-125 f3.5-f5.6 (digital)
27/40: Canon 28-90 kit lens (film)

"optimised" = film lens optimised for digital
"digital " = exclusively designed for small digital sensor
"film" = normal film lens