Pentax 21977 DA 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 ED AL (IF) DC WR Lens for Pentax Digital SLR cameras,Black

A very, very useful lens. Surprisingly, 1/2" shorter than my already-compact Pentax 16-45 f/4! This one, with that 200mm-equiv zoom, is much more versatile. Came from 'Another Deal Site', fulfilled by Amazon... mentioning this because, unlike some older posts below, this lens came in a proper box, with Ricoh warranty cards, an instruction guide AND the lens hood. Exactly as shown on the Amazon page.If I were going on a trip, I would take this lens. Or as the best choice for a walkaround-town snapshot lens. Amazon calls it 'discontinued', which is confusing, since, as of today June 9 2015, it is also for sale on the Ricoh lens web page, though at $500. It is well-made, works perfectly and immediately with my K-5 IIs, and my older K-01.Does it take good pictures? Sure. Tell you a secret though... ANY modern lens takes great pictures... re sharpness and color rendition. What we are really buying is ergonomics... how easy it is to use the lens for a hurried once-in-a-lifetime snapshot. And that gets you over to the camera... and Pentax DSLRs... all of them... have excellent autofocus if there is any light at all in the scene, any contrasting area you can use as a focus point. This 18-135 WR also lets you focus manually with a lens ring, without having to turn off autofocus. Best of both worlds. Lastly, the WR means Weather Resistant. No, you can't take it surfing, or in a pool. But it is rainproof, and dustproof, and sandproof... particularly if you are using it on a recent Pentax weather-resistant DSLR, like the K-3s, K-5s, K-30, K-50, etc, etc. So few photos are taken in the rain... but you can!

This is the Swiss-Army Knife of Pentax lenses. When you can't bring the whole toolbox, this one you want.It can do almost anything well - or at least, well enough for the person who is only bringing along one camera body. It has the greatest zoom range of any weather-resistant lens by Pentax, so when don't want to miss a shot, but don't want to ruin your camera by changing WR lenses in the kinds of weather that necessitates them - this is the lens to have.It's not a "macro" lens, but with it on my old K-5 I have taken shots of a fly so clear I can see the hairs on its back.It's not a "super" zoom with 15x, but it IS a true WR lens, with seals where they make a difference. I have taken shots in the snow - as it came down. I have taken shots in the spray of water. It can take wide angle shots and then zoom in 7.5x and get a close-up.The "softness" in the corners is primarily at the longest end of the zoom range, so I use the normal-wide settings for landscapes, and that works perfectly.But if you're taking a people-picture, when you zoom in it is still very sharp in the center where the person's face will be - and so the "softness" in the corners is like a lovely bokeh treatment of a large aperture (expensive) lens. And if I'm using it instead of a 200mm lens to capture something far away, I'm going to crop out the corners anyway and keep the sharp center portion.The focus is reasonably quick and delightfully quiet. The build is quite solid, yet light.If you take photos at the beach, in the snow, in the damp, where the wind is kicking up dust and debris, water is dripping or children knocking over large tumblers of sugary beverage next to your camera gear - this is your lens, especially if you want to take landscapes, portraits, zooms and macros all with the same lens. There will be times you are very glad you brought this one along instead of a bag full of the expensive, Limited-use limited lenses to ruin in the weather.

I bought this lens to use on my K-5 at Burning Man 2011. The Weather sealed combo served me well out there on the Playa. The range is extremely useful. I have a DA* 50-135, but really needed an all in one zoom because of the nature of Burning Man, and changing lenses is too risky and time consuming. Auto Focus is suburb even in extremely low light (with the help of the K-5's AF assist beam) and the Build Quality is rock solid. It really does have a good heft to it. It balances extremely well on my K-5 with Battery Grip.I can live with out the 2.8, and uber duber image quality...at least for what I was intending to use this lens for. The contrast is a bit lacking compared to the 50-135, but RAW files are kinda "flat" to begin with. The Distortion at 18mm is somewhat noticeable, but if you turn turn on lens correction in the camera it really is no problem. (at the cost of taking slightly longer to write to the memory card). The Lens Correction option in Lightroom or Photoshop would work very well, also.The Bokeh is nice, and I have gotten some pleasing portraits with this lens.