Which Nikon lens should you choose? What portrait lenses for Nikon exist and which one to choose.
Publication date: 11.09.2015
What lenses are suitable for my camera? This question is often heard from beginning photographers looking for a replacement for the “kit” lens included with the camera. Of course, the ideal purchase option would be to check the lens in person in the store. But many people buy equipment online and are afraid to buy a pig in a poke. What should you pay attention to in the lens description so as not to make a mistake with your choice? Let's find out.
Bayonet is the head of everything!
Bayonet is a special mount responsible for installing the lens on the camera. It is needed both for physically attaching the lens to the camera and for exchanging data between them, for which special contacts are provided in modern mounts.
Camera Nikon D610 with Nikon mount F
Nikon F- bayonet mount for Nikon SLR cameras. All lenses with this mount can at least be physically mounted on the camera. The name of the mount for which the lens is made is always indicated in its characteristics. The Nikon F mount was developed by Nikon back in the mid-20th century. Thus, on your modern camera with this mount you can install even very old Nikon lenses released decades ago. This will be especially interesting to lovers of antique optics.
So, any lens with a Nikon F mount will fit your Nikon DSLR camera. In principle, the article could have ended here, if not for one “but”. By itself, the Nikon F mount will only guarantee the physical compatibility of the camera and lens. But how do you know whether the camera’s automation and autofocus will work?.. Moreover, today some lenses are designed only for cropped cameras. How to distinguish them from the rest, and are they suitable for full-frame cameras? To do this, you need to learn to read the name of the lens. And especially pay attention to some abbreviations. There's a reason the lens names are so long - they contain a lot of useful information!
- How do you know if a lens is designed for crop only or if you have full-frame optics? Let us recall that SLR cameras are divided according to the size of the light-sensitive sensors installed in them: full-frame (having sensors the size of a regular photographic film frame) and cropped, that is, cropped (they have a slightly smaller sensor installed). Some lenses are designed so that they can only project an image onto a smaller, cropped sensor. Thus, manufacturers make their design easier and cheaper.
In the case of Nikon lenses, everything is simple. Cropped lenses have an abbreviation in their name DX. Full-frame lenses do not have it. For example, the Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8G DX Nikkor lens is designed only for crop, while the Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8G ED Nikkor is designed for full-frame cameras.
- Is it possible to install a cropped lens on a full frame camera? Yes. With Nikon devices this is quite possible! But you need to remember that optics designed for crop on full-frame cameras will produce strong vignetting - darkening at the edges of the frame. By the way, the darkening strength will depend on the specific lens model. At the same time, full-frame Nikon cameras recognize when a DX lens is installed on them and simply crop the frame to fit the size of the cropped matrix. This is how a full-frame camera turns into a cropped one. This function, by the way, can be disabled in the camera menu and you can get full-frame images with strong darkening at the edges. In principle, this darkening can even be used as a kind of creative technique!
Of course, if you have a full-frame camera, it’s hardly worth buying a specially cropped lens for it. However, if you switched from crop to full frame and still have a cropped lens, keep in mind that you can continue to use it with the new camera.
Is it possible to install a full-frame lens on a cropped camera? Undoubtedly! At the same time, all its functions will be preserved. The only thing worth considering is the crop factor. On cropped devices, all lenses “zoom in” closer. This is worth remembering when choosing optics, so that it doesn’t turn out that you are shooting in a cramped room, and the lens does not allow you to take a general shot.
Will auto focus work? All modern Nikon lenses with the abbreviations AF and AF-S in their names are equipped with autofocus capabilities. But there are subtleties here.
Lenses marked AF use a motor located inside the camera to achieve focus: the motor rotates and moves the lens lenses to focus. This type of autofocus drive is popularly called “screwdriver” due to the similarity of the part that protrudes from the mount and is responsible for moving the lenses in the lens, with the end of a screwdriver. There is no “screwdriver” autofocus drive in the most affordable and compact cameras of the 3xxx and 5xxx series (for example, Nikon D3200, Nikon D3300, Nikon D5300, Nikon D5500). So if you put a lens designed for “screwdriver” autofocus on such a camera, autofocus simply will not work - you will have to aim it manually. In this case, the focus confirmation function will work. It works as follows: the photographer selects the desired autofocus point, and then manually turns the focus ring on the lens. The rangefinder built into the camera (it is present in all modern Nikon cameras) will tell you in which direction to turn the lens focusing ring, highlighting the corresponding indicators in the camera viewfinder (they are located in the lower left corner). They also work with automatic focusing, but with manual focusing they become most useful.
Symbols for the focusing process in the viewfinder:
| Focused | |
| The lens is focused closer than necessary | |
| The lens is focused further than necessary | |
| (flashing) |
Automation cannot determine focusing accuracy. This happens when there is insufficient lighting or when trying to aim at a very uniform, low-contrast object (for example, a white ceiling). In this case, try to combine the focus point in the viewfinder with some contrasting object in your future frame. |
However, “screwdriver” lenses are gradually becoming a thing of the past, long ago giving way to a more modern series of lenses with ultrasonic motors located directly inside the lens. Such lenses are designated by the abbreviation AF-S, and they work faster and much quieter than their “screwdriver” counterparts.
With AF-S lenses, autofocus will work on all modern Nikon cameras.
A superficial overview of the Nikon lens line
Most likely, if you don't shoot with a Canon DSLR, you use a Nikon camera. While many other companies make excellent cameras, these two companies own the bulk of the market, and their battle is epic - several decades of battle for leadership. Nikon is older, the company's history dates back to 1917 as Nippon Kogaku Kogyo Kabushikigara.
Today digital mirror lenses Nikons are divided into cropped DX (APS-C) and full-frame FX (35mm), but both lens formats use the same Nikon F mount. Since this type of mount has remained virtually unchanged since 1959, modern Nikon DSLRs can (with some exceptions) use the lenses over the past more than 55 years. This is one of the features that allowed the company to gain its fans.
Cropped (DX) Nikon lenses
Designed for beginning photographers using the company's smaller DSLRs, such as the D3000-3200, D5000-5600, D7000-7200, DX lenses are smaller, lighter and generally more affordable than their FX counterparts. It's impressive that Nikon offers about 2 times as many crop lenses as Canon. In addition to the usual kit lenses, you can buy the entire line, starting from fish eye, macro lenses, to telephoto lenses.
Please note that cropped and full-frame Nikons have the same mount, with very different sizes matrices
Thanks to the fact that the mount has not changed for many years, you can use both modern and old full-frame lenses with your crop camera. Depending on what model you have, you can use lenses up to 1977 without any problems. By the way, most cropped lenses can be used on full-frame Nikon cameras, thanks to the crop mode.
On older Nikon models (d7000 and older, d600 and older) there is a lever for controlling the aperture position. If you are using older Nikon lenses without electronics, the lever transmits the aperture value to the camera. You only need to specify the maximum value in the camera settings, and then the camera will handle it itself. In addition, on older Nikon lenses, the aperture jumper and autofocus confirmation work (a light comes on in the corner of the viewfinder), allowing you to work as comfortably as possible. For example, Helios-81N on my Nikon D600 is fully functional, except for the lack of autofocus.
Unfortunately, younger Nikon models (3000, 5000 series, D60, D40) do not have a focus motor built into the camera, so autofocus is only possible for them in conjunction with AF-S G series lenses (or similar lenses from other manufacturers). Earlier D lenses will not focus automatically, so you will have to look for modern lenses for them.
Nikon Full Frame (FX) Lenses
Most Nikon F mount lenses released for Nikon cameras are full frame and are labeled FX (which means full frame). These lenses are designed to cover the full frame FX sensors of Nikon cameras such as the D600, D700 and D800 and their successors. This means that they also cover APS-C (crop) DX sensors.
It turns out that these lenses are larger and heavier than their DX format counterparts and tend to be more expensive. Additionally, while there are many versatile zoom lenses and low-cost solutions available, many lenses are aimed at professional photographers and advanced hobbyists. These lenses include super-fast, super-telephoto and high-quality macro lenses.
There are currently about 70 Nikon FX format lenses on the market, plus many third-party models such as Sigma, Tamron, Tokina, Samyang. In addition, you can use several generations of Nikon manual lenses with Nikon F mount (specifically Ai and Ai-S) without adapters and start shooting right away.
Terms you need to know
Although Nikon does not patent names and acronyms as aggressively as some other companies, Nikon continues to use some abbreviations and designations on its lenses. The company also uses several terms that are not written on the lenses, but are important for understanding the subject.
Nikkor: name of Nikon's lens division.
DX: DX format lenses are designed for entry-level Nikon DSLRs with cropped matrices (APS-C) - D40, D60, D3000, D5000, D7000 and their successors. They can be used on full-frame (FX) cameras in crop mode.
FX: FX lenses are designed to cover the full frame sensor on D600, D700, D800, D3, D4, D5 (and Df) series cameras. Since they have the exact same mount as DX lenses, they can be mounted on DX cameras, with a few exceptions.
G And D lens types: The difference is simple: Nikon lenses D-type lenses have an aperture adjustment ring, but G-lenses do not. G lenses have a focusing motor, while D lenses do not. Some newer DX DSLRs (including the D3000) do not support autofocus with D series lenses due to the lack of a motor inside the camera.
VR: Nikon's abbreviation, which is used to refer to optical image stabilization, comes from the English "Vibrant Reduction." A newer version of the stabilizer, called VR II, works on some new lenses.
AF: Lenses marked with an AF mark use an internal focusing motor SLR camera to focus. These lenses will not focus on lower-end Nikon DSLRs.
AF-S: Lenses marked AF-S have a focusing motor built into the lens. Autofocus of AF-S lenses works on all Nikon digital SLRs.
SWM: Short for "Silent Wave Motor," this term refers to the ultrasonic motor built into AF-S lenses.
N: Indicates Nikon's proprietary nanocrystalline coating, designed to reduce ghosting, ghosting and internal reflections.
ED: The lens contains ultra-low dispersion lenses that reduce the amount of chromatic aberration in photographs.
FL: Some Nikon lenses—especially super telephoto lenses—use fluorite glass lenses, which reduce chromatic aberration and weigh much less than regular glass.
Micro: This is just a peculiar distortion of the word “Macro” performed by Nikon. If the lens description says Micro-Nikkor, then it is a macro lens.
To determine the lens you need, think about what exactly you want to capture. There are several types of photography: landscape, portrait, macro photography, reportage photography, etc. Although there are several universal lenses, most good glasses are still “tailored” for specific purposes.