I didn't like the DA16-45 very much. I found it bulky and its "reverse direction" zooming made it an awkward lens to use at wide angle settings ... it doesn't balance well. Felt the same way about the (even larger and heavier) Canon EF 24-75/2.8L when I had it.
I have the DA*16-50/2.8. It is a better balanced lens than the DA16-45 and feels nicer in use. I still prefer using the 14, 21, 43 mm primes in this range due to their smaller, handier size and weight, but the 16-50 proves to be a fine performer and minimizes lens changes when you're working with quickly changing circumstances. 16mm focal length on the DSLRs nets the same field of view that a 24mm lens provides on traditional 35mm film cameras. That's a pretty wide angle field of view, about 8% greater than what you're used to seeing with the 18-55 mm lens (84 diagonal degrees vs 77.4). My long- standing "widest useful field of view", personally, has been the 90 degree diagonal provided by the 14mm on the DSLRs ... If you want that, you'll need the DA12-24/4 or DA14/2.8. While there's something cool about ultra-ultra wide FoV, I find practical application of such FoV to be fairly limited. When I examine my lens use from 2007, whether with a zoom or a prime, I find the greatest frequency of keepers in the range from 20-30 mm. Good luck! Godfrey -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
