Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bruce Walker wrote: On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 2:37 AM, Aahz Maruch a...@pobox.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, J.C. O'Connell wrote: On 7/6/2013 2:19 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bipin Gupta wrote: What Aahz, whats this would need to get a K-5 first... ;-) ?? With prices hitting the bottom most at around $ 600 please grab one. You wont regret it. Even the K-5 II is hardly $ 70 more than the K-5. The problem isn't the body, it's the glass. I don't own any Pentax equipment currently (I rented for my cruise), and I haven't decided yet what kind of equipment I want to get medium-term. If I was starting from scratch, I would go with NIkon, better range of dslrs and you can use newer af glass, as well as vintage mf glass. No FF with Pentax, no vintage mf glass with Canon. Nikon weather-resistant lenses are more spendy than Pentax, I don't care about FF, I like in-camera shake reduction for prime lenses, and I have a soft spot for Pentax because I grew up with it. Basically, my choices boil down to Pentax, m4/3, or high-end PS with occasional equipment rental when I need the best (the last is what I'm currently doing). As I mentioned in another post recently, my impression is that long-term (more than 5-10 years out), *all* the camera makers are poor bets due to likely technological disruption, which makes me leery of investing in glass. 5-10 years out you could be bored with photography, blind or dead. Buy glass now while you can still enjoy it. :-) Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250 $1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR $700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. -- Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6http://rule6.info/ * * * Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
Not an entirely accurate assumption - unless (1)you never buy any other Pentax cameras, (2)you throw away all your Pentax equipment at the end of five years, (3)*ALL* the photography you're doing with your current equipment continues as is and you *NEVER* use the Pentax equipment for photography you might otherwise do with what you currently own, and (4)you also never replace what you have now during that five year period. -p On 7/6/2013 9:26 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bruce Walker wrote: On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 2:37 AM, Aahz Maruch a...@pobox.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, J.C. O'Connell wrote: On 7/6/2013 2:19 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bipin Gupta wrote: What Aahz, whats this would need to get a K-5 first... ;-) ?? With prices hitting the bottom most at around $ 600 please grab one. You wont regret it. Even the K-5 II is hardly $ 70 more than the K-5. The problem isn't the body, it's the glass. I don't own any Pentax equipment currently (I rented for my cruise), and I haven't decided yet what kind of equipment I want to get medium-term. If I was starting from scratch, I would go with NIkon, better range of dslrs and you can use newer af glass, as well as vintage mf glass. No FF with Pentax, no vintage mf glass with Canon. Nikon weather-resistant lenses are more spendy than Pentax, I don't care about FF, I like in-camera shake reduction for prime lenses, and I have a soft spot for Pentax because I grew up with it. Basically, my choices boil down to Pentax, m4/3, or high-end PS with occasional equipment rental when I need the best (the last is what I'm currently doing). As I mentioned in another post recently, my impression is that long-term (more than 5-10 years out), *all* the camera makers are poor bets due to likely technological disruption, which makes me leery of investing in glass. 5-10 years out you could be bored with photography, blind or dead. Buy glass now while you can still enjoy it. :-) Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250 $1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR $700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. -- Being old doesn't seem so old now that I'm old. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
Aahz, the primary oversight in your calculation is the apparent assumption that your gear will go to $00.00 in value after some number of years. A second possible mistake in your calculation is the notion that your gear has value only during the hours it is being used. You can't get image files without a mechanism to capture those files. Let's call that device a camera since that is the topic here. So, you use the camera x hours to produce images. But you also then have y hours of entertainment (or challenge, agony, boredom, fascination, whatever . . . ) processing those images as you transmogrify the electrons into web pictures and/or prints. And then, over many years to come, you have z hours of pleasure as you and friends and family look at those old images and reminisce. You may prefer to minimize y, but x needs to be large enough to keep z from approaching zero. And the camera's per-hour value should be calculated against x+y+z, not against x alone IMHO. stan On Jul 6, 2013, at 10:26 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bruce Walker wrote: On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 2:37 AM, Aahz Maruch a...@pobox.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, J.C. O'Connell wrote: On 7/6/2013 2:19 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bipin Gupta wrote: What Aahz, whats this would need to get a K-5 first... ;-) ?? With prices hitting the bottom most at around $ 600 please grab one. You wont regret it. Even the K-5 II is hardly $ 70 more than the K-5. The problem isn't the body, it's the glass. I don't own any Pentax equipment currently (I rented for my cruise), and I haven't decided yet what kind of equipment I want to get medium-term. If I was starting from scratch, I would go with NIkon, better range of dslrs and you can use newer af glass, as well as vintage mf glass. No FF with Pentax, no vintage mf glass with Canon. Nikon weather-resistant lenses are more spendy than Pentax, I don't care about FF, I like in-camera shake reduction for prime lenses, and I have a soft spot for Pentax because I grew up with it. Basically, my choices boil down to Pentax, m4/3, or high-end PS with occasional equipment rental when I need the best (the last is what I'm currently doing). As I mentioned in another post recently, my impression is that long-term (more than 5-10 years out), *all* the camera makers are poor bets due to likely technological disruption, which makes me leery of investing in glass. 5-10 years out you could be bored with photography, blind or dead. Buy glass now while you can still enjoy it. :-) Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250$1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR$700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. -- Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6http://rule6.info/ * * * Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Stan Halpin wrote: Aahz, the primary oversight in your calculation is the apparent assumption that your gear will go to $00.00 in value after some number of years. Not really -- I've learned from painful experience that getting rid of photo equipment is a big hassle (for me, YMMV), so yes, that was an implicit assumption because of the time involved. It may not be literally zero, but it's functionally zero. You could make a similar argument that the equipment will likely still work in five years and therefore I don't need to amortize over the short period of time, but I might just as easily get into a situation where I'm just not doing photography anymore and therefore the equipment is now gathering dust (and therefore functionally worthless to me). Five years is the longest possible amortization time I'm comfortable with; the numbers get worse with a shorter time. A second possible mistake in your calculation is the notion that your gear has value only during the hours it is being used. You can't get image files without a mechanism to capture those files. Let's call that device a camera since that is the topic here. So, you use the camera x hours to produce images. But you also then have y hours of entertainment (or challenge, agony, boredom, fascination, whatever . . . ) processing those images as you transmogrify the electrons into web pictures and/or prints. And then, over many years to come, you have z hours of pleasure as you and friends and family look at those old images and reminisce. You may prefer to minimize y, but x needs to be large enough to keep z from approaching zero. And the camera's per-hour value should be calculated against x+y+z, not against x alone IMHO. That's true, and I skipped it in simplifying the calculation. Doesn't really change the basic principle involved, though. Ditto to Paul Sorenson's points. On Jul 6, 2013, at 10:26 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bruce Walker wrote: On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 2:37 AM, Aahz Maruch a...@pobox.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, J.C. O'Connell wrote: On 7/6/2013 2:19 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bipin Gupta wrote: What Aahz, whats this would need to get a K-5 first... ;-) ?? With prices hitting the bottom most at around $ 600 please grab one. You wont regret it. Even the K-5 II is hardly $ 70 more than the K-5. The problem isn't the body, it's the glass. I don't own any Pentax equipment currently (I rented for my cruise), and I haven't decided yet what kind of equipment I want to get medium-term. If I was starting from scratch, I would go with NIkon, better range of dslrs and you can use newer af glass, as well as vintage mf glass. No FF with Pentax, no vintage mf glass with Canon. Nikon weather-resistant lenses are more spendy than Pentax, I don't care about FF, I like in-camera shake reduction for prime lenses, and I have a soft spot for Pentax because I grew up with it. Basically, my choices boil down to Pentax, m4/3, or high-end PS with occasional equipment rental when I need the best (the last is what I'm currently doing). As I mentioned in another post recently, my impression is that long-term (more than 5-10 years out), *all* the camera makers are poor bets due to likely technological disruption, which makes me leery of investing in glass. 5-10 years out you could be bored with photography, blind or dead. Buy glass now while you can still enjoy it. :-) Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR$1150 DA* 60-250 $1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR $700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. -- Hugs and backrubs --
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Paul Sorenson wrote: Not an entirely accurate assumption - unless (1)you never buy any other Pentax cameras, (2)you throw away all your Pentax equipment at the end of five years, (3)*ALL* the photography you're doing with your current equipment continues as is and you *NEVER* use the Pentax equipment for photography you might otherwise do with what you currently own, and (4)you also never replace what you have now during that five year period. One other thing about point (3): my cruise reminded me of just how bulky and heavy DSLR gear is and how unlikely I am to use it casually. Heck, even the Canon G1X is too heavy for extended holding in the hand for fast point-and-shoot (compared with the Nikon P7100). So maybe a better way of thinking about the time calculation should be, Would I take this stuff on at least six four-hour expeditions per year? -- Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6http://rule6.info/ * * * 'Does it say something about our culture that academic is sometimes used as a synonym for irrelevant?' --Marc Wilson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
My take would be if that's the system you want look at capabilities, not actual lenses. You could save a bit by getting a used DA 16-50mm a very good lens, assuming you're going to want the extra reach of 60-250 which will cover the middle to long telephoto range and look for a good used A 100mm f4.0 since most macro work is best manual focus anyway, and it's very good lens that can be had for a lot less money. That combo would give you almost the same capability and cut your cost by 1/3 to 1/2. On 7/6/2013 10:26 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bruce Walker wrote: On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 2:37 AM, Aahz Maruch a...@pobox.com wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, J.C. O'Connell wrote: On 7/6/2013 2:19 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Bipin Gupta wrote: What Aahz, whats this would need to get a K-5 first... ;-) ?? With prices hitting the bottom most at around $ 600 please grab one. You wont regret it. Even the K-5 II is hardly $ 70 more than the K-5. The problem isn't the body, it's the glass. I don't own any Pentax equipment currently (I rented for my cruise), and I haven't decided yet what kind of equipment I want to get medium-term. If I was starting from scratch, I would go with NIkon, better range of dslrs and you can use newer af glass, as well as vintage mf glass. No FF with Pentax, no vintage mf glass with Canon. Nikon weather-resistant lenses are more spendy than Pentax, I don't care about FF, I like in-camera shake reduction for prime lenses, and I have a soft spot for Pentax because I grew up with it. Basically, my choices boil down to Pentax, m4/3, or high-end PS with occasional equipment rental when I need the best (the last is what I'm currently doing). As I mentioned in another post recently, my impression is that long-term (more than 5-10 years out), *all* the camera makers are poor bets due to likely technological disruption, which makes me leery of investing in glass. 5-10 years out you could be bored with photography, blind or dead. Buy glass now while you can still enjoy it. :-) Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250 $1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR $700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. -- There are two kinds of computer users those who've experienced a hard drive failure, and those that will. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013 at 07:26:55AM -0700, Aahz Maruch wrote: Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250$1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR$700 That's $3200, divide by $25/hour and that's 128 hours. So I'd need to use that for at least 25 hours per year over five years to get my money's worth. And that's rock-bottom minimum, I'd really want a normal or wide-angle lens F2.8 or wider. Buying used would save some money at the cost of time (keh.com doesn't have them all right now and a used 60-250 isn't much cheaper than new). Then there's the fact that I rented two bodies for the cruise, and it's really really handy to not switch lenses... Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. Aahz, It's a damn good thing for you that you aren't into something like racing. My first track time, 25 years ago, was at Bondurant, and it worked out to something like $100 per hour of track time. In retrospect, that was some of the cheapest track time I've had. If I were racing, and were honest about my expenses, in a cheap to run class, and not trying to win, I might be able to do it for as little as $300 per hour of track time. $600 for a lens? That's just a weekend of racing, and since I'm not racing these day... no problem! Then there's flying. One reason I never got my pilot's license is that flying makes racing look cheap. More seriously, certain levels of performance come with a cost. With some things, like sensors, the cost of performance gets cheaper over time. The entry level K500 will outperform any APS sensor camera of not that many years ago, and the full frame cameras from not long before that. Other things, well I used to know someone with a .sig that said If it weren't for law enforcement and physics, I'd be unstoppable. If you want a lens with certain capabilities, physics says it has to be a certain size. -- Larry Colen l...@red4est.com http://red4est.com/lrc -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, Larry Colen wrote: Aahz, It's a damn good thing for you that you aren't into something like racing. My first track time, 25 years ago, was at Bondurant, and it worked out to something like $100 per hour of track time. In retrospect, that was some of the cheapest track time I've had. If I were racing, and were honest about my expenses, in a cheap to run class, and not trying to win, I might be able to do it for as little as $300 per hour of track time. $600 for a lens? That's just a weekend of racing, and since I'm not racing these day... no problem! Then there's flying. One reason I never got my pilot's license is that flying makes racing look cheap. Yup, I know! And yet my primary and I are willing to fly to Wisconsin for a weekend convention that actually lasts four days; what with various medical issues and getting a little family time, that ends up being nine hotel nights, car rental, flights, etc, for several thousand dollars. Photo equipment comes out of a different budget, though. (In general, I prioritize spending time with people; if I start prioritizing photography differently -- higher -- that changes the equation quite a bit.) More seriously, certain levels of performance come with a cost. With some things, like sensors, the cost of performance gets cheaper over time. The entry level K500 will outperform any APS sensor camera of not that many years ago, and the full frame cameras from not long before that. Other things, well I used to know someone with a .sig that said If it weren't for law enforcement and physics, I'd be unstoppable. If you want a lens with certain capabilities, physics says it has to be a certain size. Absolutely! I just need to feel comfortable with [paying the money for] that. -- Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6http://rule6.info/ * * * Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Calculating hobby cost (was Re: Bracketing on the K5 with pictures of menus)
On Sat, Jul 06, 2013, P.J. Alling wrote: On 7/6/2013 10:26 AM, Aahz Maruch wrote: Right -- the question is whether I'll enjoy the glass enough over 5-10 years. The way I think about stuff like this, I guess/calculate how much it costs per hour. So a movie these days is about $10-$15/hour (ticket plus munchies). So let's look at how much basic Pentax gear would cost me, assuming I buy new (all Amazon prices, rounding to nearest $50): K-5 II with 18-135 WR $1150 DA* 60-250$1350 D-FA 100mm macro WR$700 Normally I wouldn't be quite so rigorous in my analysis, but that much money makes me think, especially when I already have equipment that gives me about eighty percent of this capability (and is significantly better in some respects, namely bulk/weight/convenience: Nikon P7100, Canon G1X with 250D closeup lens, and a Fuji X-S1 that arrives Tuesday). So really, that's 25 hrs/yr *in addition* to what I'm already doing for taking photos. Makes it a lot harder to justify to myself. My take would be if that's the system you want look at capabilities, not actual lenses. You could save a bit by getting a used DA 16-50mm a very good lens, assuming you're going to want the extra reach of 60-250 which will cover the middle to long telephoto range and look for a good used A 100mm f4.0 since most macro work is best manual focus anyway, and it's very good lens that can be had for a lot less money. That combo would give you almost the same capability and cut your cost by 1/3 to 1/2. Assuming you mean the DA* 16-50 (as opposed to the DA 16-45), that's a pretty spendy lens itself, and I had some issues with it (more details in another post, but my experience was that it's very nice glass in a shitty lens) -- would only get it as a second-tier lens. I do specifically want the 18-135 WR because of the WR and the zoom range (for walk-around capability), plus it's a pretty nice lens. Ditto the D-FA 100mm (which also has a wider aperture), and the kind of macro work I do (mostly outdoor flower porn) definitely takes advantage of auto-focus. (I took a fair number of shots in the rain on my Alaska cruise, IMO there's not much point spending the money on a DSLR-like unless my primary bodies and lenses are WR.) I have indeed thought about capabilities. ;-) -- Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6http://rule6.info/ * * * Help a hearing-impaired person: http://rule6.info/hearing.html -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
