Nikon DSLR and manual focus lenses

Lena · Joined: 24 Apr 2012 Posts: 495 Location: Pl

Anyone here using D7000? I have a chance to upgrade my D90 and D7000 is my first thought after reading reviews and some other forum's threads. I'm using AF lenses as well as MF ones ( Nikon mount and M42 with adapters ).
I was also thinkig of D300/D300s, but most reviews I've read are strongly in favour of D7000 and D300s appears to be similarily priced ( used bodies ).

Any advice welcome. Thanks.

Zsolt · Joined: 24 Dec 2012 Posts: 8 Location: HUNGARY

Hi,
I suggest the D300s. I use it for manual lens also. Body has internal focus measuring and exposure display and it works with my old M42 lens perfectly. I use my lens without adapter but achived infinity with a small modification. Not need additional lens. My best pictures made by Pancolar 50 and Sonnar 135 lens.
Regards,

sichko · Joined: 20 Jun 2008 Posts: 2475 Location: South West UK

Lena · Joined: 24 Apr 2012 Posts: 495 Location: Pl

Thank you both.

Currently a new D7000 body sells for about the same as a nice second-hand D300s so I think I'll get myself a new camera. I desperately need the AF fine tuning since I love my Tokinas and the D90 is simply not getting the AF right with any of the two lenses I have. The situation with Tamron is slightly better, but not satisfactory either.

I read a number of user posts on the national Nikon forum and there were many D7000 bodies that needed calibration, especially from the series beginning with 64... Basically people who managed to get the focus right with an adjustment of +/- 5-7 didn't send the cameras, but some Tokina users claimed that even -20 wasn't enough to get the focus right. Fortunately my next-door neighbour runs a camera shop and this would be my third camera from him so I hope he will assist me in getting a good body without any AF problems.

NikonAIS · Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2014 3:19 am Post subject:

When I finally decided to get a DSLR, after many years of resisting to take the "digital" plunge, my choice of camera was predicated solely on one thing, the fact that I had a couple dozen AI and AIS lenses from 16mm to 600mm and compatibility was a hard and fast requirement. Autofocus held no fascination for me. Why should it? I had been focusing manually for 40 years and it posed no limitations for me. I had owned two zooms in my life, an 80-200mm f/4.5 non-AI and 36-72mm f/3.5 Series E, but they too were gone by this time. I also had no desire whatsoever to get anything in DX format as I did not want my oft used 20mm Nikkor to become a 30mm Nikkor, I already had a 35mm Nikkor. The D3 series at the time was more than I was willing to pay so the D700 with the accessory battery pack seemed to be the best alternative. Still, it came to about 3 grand, which was a hard sell to my wife. I explained to her that at the time I got my F2 and MD-2, the price back then was probably close in "equivalent dollars" to what the D700 was costing me. 3 years on I am still very happy with it though I am still a somewhat ambivalent when it comes to digital. The D700 is a workhorse in work where a client wants proof sheets that day, something that would be very difficult to pull off with film since I do not do photography as a full time profession. Having looked at one in a camera store, several trusty Nikkors in hand, it became immediately obvious to me that the standard focusing screen simply was not going to cut it. I ordered a microprism/ground glass screen from focusingscreen.com the same day I ordered my D700. It arrived the day after the camera did. It took 10 minutes to swap out the screens and it has worked out beautifully. I have been looking for a more up to date camera and looked hard at the D800 but since no one offered manual focusing screens at the time, I looked at a D3X as D3 screens were plentiful. Now that focusingscreen.com makes screens for the D800 I may look at it again later on this year.

In spite of all of this, 95% of all of my personal images are still shot with film, the majority of which are shot with the Hasselblad unless I need an equivalent focal length I do not have with the Blad

otto_tz · Joined: 31 Jul 2014 Posts: 4

Hi everyone. I was wondering which focal length is the best to shoot full length portraits on a DX cropped sensor camera (Nikon D3100)? I own a Carl Zess Pancolar 50/1.8 and Chinon 135/2.8. I was hoping that Chinon would be able to take that kind of shots, but it is somehow too short. What focal lengths should I check out and which lens are the best?