frosty

It was a wee bit cold all day and when I came out to the car this evening large, sweeping crystals had formed on the car screen. We had some amazing forms on the house windows last year, very ornate and reminiscent of Rococo furniture or a liberty print.

I've been busy scouring e-bay to see if I can find some cheap lenses to add to the stock 18-55mm. The stock lens is pretty good, really, but something a bit longer would be very handy as would a better portrait lens. I used to have a lovely lens for my old film SLR (15-odd years ago. Pentax P30n, 50mm, f1.4) which I should never have sold. Doh.

If you're not phased by manual lenses then there are some real bargains to be had. 135mm, f2.5, mint for £45! The effective focal length is different due to the smaller size of the DSLR sensor (the focal length doesn't change at all; rather the field of view that you get with a DSLR is the same as you would have got with an SLR with a longer lens... 135mm should be like having an ~200mm DSLR lens). The camera manual says I should be able to use manual lenses with the K-r body, so it's worth a try! But you probably all know this already...

Next time: MTF and a simple optics experiment to do at home.