On Wed, 17 Aug 2005, Glen wrote:
At 10:55 AM 8/17/2005, Andre Langevin wrote:
Pentax Canada rep told my retailer that the FA 50/1.4 is now discontinued
and that they won't supply back-orders. Pentax Canada gets their lenses
directly from Japan, so I guess the lens is no longer produced in Japan.
A new DA 50/1.4 on the way?
If it were to be a DA series, I would expect something more like a DA 33mm
f1.4, because of the crop factor.
I would still expect a 50/1.4 because it implies minimal R&D, unlike
the 33; there is also a huge overlap with the existing 31. Note that
these (30-odd mm) lenses are retrofocus designs and a useful 1.4 is
likely to weigh a ton a be 2 meters long. Shall I make a prediction on
price too? :-)
I'm definitely going to be disappointed if there will no longer be an f1.4
lens of any sort. I'm getting tired of all the f4 and slower lenses which
seem to dominate. I would really like to have some faster options for
low-light shooting.
They don't dominate. Primes are still in the 2-2.8 range. Take a look
at Boj's page; what happened to the 24/28/35 3.5 lenses of yesteryear?
If we are talking zooms, I recently passed on a reasonably (but still
a bit of dosh) priced FA*28-70/2.8 on KEH (don't look for it :-)
because I did not think it would be that better than the
FA24-90/3.5-4.5 to justify the back-breaking weight and garish
appearance.
I'm also tired of all the zooms which don't hold their aperture throughout
the zoom range. Is it that difficult or expensive to make a constant-aperture
zoom? I seem to remember that once upon a time, that was the typical way of
building zoom lenses. If they could do it in "the good old days", then why
not now? These days, constant-aperture zooms are rare.
That's a design compromise, affecting size, weight and price. I see no
problem with the FA24-90/3.5-4.5. The FA24-70/4 is known to
self-destruct, but this may be a one-off. Why do you mind changing
aperture? It's only a problem with manual flash, or am I missing
something?
Kostas
