On Jun 16, 2006, at 10:49 AM, David Savage wrote: > I must admit, as a long time zoom user I'm now something of a "prime > snob", so the zooms don't get much of a workout.
:-) In the past, I always tried zooms with my 35mm SLR gear and gave them up for various reasons of flare, size, weight or speed. I never considered my self a 'prime snob', I just tend to work with relatively few focal lengths and prefer the speed and size of the primes. In recent years, zoom lenses have really come a long way with with some exceptional quality performance. The fixed lens digital camera lenses at the high end are remarkable ... the lenses on my Sony F707/ F717/R1, Konica Minolta A2, and Panasonic FZ10 have been amazing performers. My shooting habits, however, haven't changed as much. I still tend to prefer prime focal lengths for their speed and compactness, even though the margins are smaller than they used to be. But the wide to normal range provided by the FA20-35 is such a perfect match for that huge percentage of my photography, and the FA20-35 is such a good performer, that it's won me over and I hardly miss having primes in this range except occasionally for the speed. While I still have the 100-300 and 35-70, I don't think I've taken a picture with either of them in months and months. I'm rarely using anything longer than the 77mm now, most of my "long lens" work is the FA50/1.4! Godfrey -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
