Nikon lens interchangability

[rcollins8338]

I have a Nikon FM that I bought back in '76, along with a few lenses. I'd like to upgrade to a Nikon DSLR camera, but I want to verify whether the lenses I already have will work with a newer Nikon DSLR. Can anyone tell me if any, (or all) of the newer DSLR Nikons have the same bayonet mounting as my FM model?

 

[Woodyg3]

This might help

Nikon Camera and Lens Compatibility Chart

The Camera to Lens Compatibility Chart contains the complete Nikon lineup.

www.nikonians.org

 

[Marilynne]

Welcome!

Please feel free to introduce yourself here - new member

 

[rcollins8338]

I have a Nikon FM that I bought back in '76, along with a few lenses. I'd like to upgrade to a Nikon DSLR camera, but I want to verify whether the lenses I already have will work with a newer Nikon DSLR. Can anyone tell me if any, (or all) of the newer DSLR Nikons have the same bayonet mounting as my FM model?

Thank you, Woodyg3. It looks like I'm going to have to invest in a whole new setup in order to get what I have, with a Nikon DSLR. I appreciate your quick reply.

 

[Clovishound]

If you are starting over, consider one of Nikon's mirrorless Z mount cameras. Nikon quit development of new DSLRs in favor of mirrorless a few years back. They continue to sell DSLR bodies and lenses, but they are dropping them from their line, little by little.

FYI, you can still use F mount lenses on Z mount cameras with an FTZ adapter. The newer lenses will retain all their features. Older F mount lenses work, but may not have all features, such as autofocus or camera control of aperture.

 

[andreaandri]

Nikon lenses offer great interchangeability but compatibility depends on the camera mount type (F-mount or Z-mount) and features like autofocus motors. Older lenses may need adapters for newer mirrorless models. Always check lens specifications to ensure full functionality with your Nikon camera. The right lens choice enhances creativity and image quality

 

[Lisa Zee]

I’ve got a Nikon Z and bought a used Sigma Telephoto and a used Nikon F Macro lens. I can only use them in M, A or S mode and I find these modes hard to work out (I’m new to photography). So far all the photos I’ve taken with them are blurry and the lighting is off. Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[Clovishound]

I’ve got a Nikon Z and bought a used Sigma Telephoto and a used Nikon F Macro lens. I can only use them in M, A or S mode and I find these modes hard to work out (I’m new to photography). So far all the photos I’ve taken with them are blurry and the lighting is off. Has anyone else experienced this?

It would be helpful to have more information. Exactly which lenses do you have? ie, full model numbers. It would also help to post an image from each that shows the issues you are having. Please leave the metadata (EXIF data) intact when you post them, if possible, so we can see the full info on how the photo was taken.

 

[Lisa Zee]

It would be helpful to have more information. Exactly which lenses do you have? ie, full model numbers. It would also help to post an image from each that shows the issues you are having. Please leave the metadata (EXIF data) intact when you post them, if possible, so we can see the full info on how the photo was taken.

I’ll start with the Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS Contemporary Optical Lens for Nikon F Mount. I use an F to Z adapter. Here is a bad photo where I was trying to get the bird (brown blur). I’ve included the information for the photo.
I also thought the black marks could be lens fungus but the guy I bought the lens from said it was dust on the sensor. I blew the sensor and the issue is still there. I also don’t see the black marks with my other lenses. Thanks for your help and any advice would be amazing.

 

[Needa]

@Liza Zee
Turn on Focus point in the Playback display option if you haven't so you can review the actual location of the focus point.
Not sure what happened your image posted very small.

 

[Clovishound]

OK, here are a couple observations, not sure any of these will answer your question.

1. You are shooting this at F/22. While this will increase your depth of field, you probably should be closer to wide open, or perhaps F/8.

2. Because of your small aperture your ISO is 8000. A wider aperture will give you a more reasonable ISO.

3. Your shutter speed is 1/1000 sec. This is a reasonable shutter speed, especially if you are shooting handheld. A lower shutter speed could probably be tolerated, especially if you are using a tripod, or have good skills at steady holding. This would allow you to reduce ISO further. However, I would rather have a sharp, but noisy image (due to high ISO), than choose too low a shutter speed and have motion blur. It's asll a matter of trade offs, and requires trial and error to see your limits based on your equipment and your skills.

4. You are using single point AF. Again, this is likely a good choice for shooting a static bird. My question here is did you have that single point on the bird? Needa brought this up in a post while I was writing this. Not familiar with the controls on the Z50ii, but my Z5 and Z7ii will often have the focus point in a corner due to inadvertently hitting either the little joystick on the back, or I have the focus touch activated and my nose hits the screen and moves the point. The center of the frame is a good spot to start with for your focus point. You can put that on the subject and half press to lock focus, then move your frame and press the shutter all the way down to take the photo. Alternately, you could try auto focus area, and the camera will grab onto something.

5. I believe this lens should have relatively full compatibility with your camera.

As a side note, the image you posted is basically a thumbnail, and too small to really see much detail. Try posting something around 1000 pixels or so on the long side. On this forum you can upload images directly from your computer. The easiest way is to edit them to desired size and then upload them using the "Attach files" button at the bottom of the posting box. You included the EXIF info as a separate file, which is great, however, if you don't strip the metadata from the image file, it will be included in the post and we can access it from the image file posted. That just makes it a little easier for you.

 

[Lisa Zee]

Thanks so much Needa and Clovishound. I have taken note of your points and will give these a go.
The Sigma lens doesn't have the chip inside to communicate with the camera body like the newer Nikkor Z lenses do, which is why it can only be used in M, A or S mode. As a newbie, I have been using Auto and Scene mode (with the Nikkor lens) a lot as I practice, but really want to get better at using manual mode.
It's good to know the Sigma is still compatible as I was thinking I'd made a rookie mistake by buying it.
I've re-uploaded the blurry picture so you can see it better.

 

[Clovishound]

Looks like the The issue with this image is that the focus is on the bushes in the background. With single focus point mode there should be a little red box in the viewfinder/backscreen. The camera will focus on whatever that box is on. Again, just put that box over whatever you want focused on and half press the shutter button, then recompose while still holding the button at half press, then push all the way down to take the shot. An quick method for placing the red box in the center of the screen is to push the OK button on the back of the camera just above the i and the Menu button.

Aperture preferred is easy to use. Just select the aperture you want, and the camera will select the shutter speed automatically. Keep an eye on the ISO, if you have it set to auto.

An easy method to use manual is to set the aperture and shutter speed and put the ISO in auto. The camera will select the correct ISO for proper exposure. Again, you have to keep an eye on the ISO and perhaps make changes if it goes too high, or bottoms out. This is the mode I normally use for wildlife photography. Of course, I started out with a camera that was fully mechanical. I had to use a handheld light meter and transfer settings to the camera, or just guess at the settings. The nice thing about mirrorless is that it will give a preview of exposure in the viewfinder.

As to compatibility of the lens. Here is a webpage that addresses compatibility of Sigma lenses with Z cameras using the FTZ.

FTZ compatible lenses

 

[BF Hammer]

@Lisa Zee : I also have the Sigma 150-600mm C lens. I have used it on my Z5 with FTZ-II adapter, as well as my D750 and previously with a D7000 body. The lens is fully compatible with any auto mode the Z body has, no different to use than the F-mount D750 and D7000.

I like to photograph birds in S-mode (shutter priority) because I want to be able to also catch them in flight as well as perched. I will be in S-mode, 1/1000 second or 1/800 second, and I like to set the ISO at 100 with auto ISO on. Fast speed to stop motion blur. The camera will select the right aperture to expose the photo, and also increase the ISO if the aperture is maxed-out. On the lens the focus selector switch has 3 positons. "MO" is Manual Override, which means you can grab the focus ring and manually adjust focus if the autofocus is missing your subject. I use that mode nearly all the time. When you do that, a feature called "focus peaking" becomes active in the camera and a highlight will be displayed around the part of the photo that is focused. So if you do that and make a highlight appear around your bird, or at least it's head, then you have focused the right thing.

Autofocus and making it work for you is a very long chapter in the book of photography. There are confusing modes and each is optimized for different styles of photos. Try to just learn some small bites at a time until you understand the bigger picture of what is going on.

 

[Lisa Zee]

Hi Clovishound:
Getting quite frustrated with this lens. On Wednesday I took 120 photos at the reserve early evening with beautiful golden light (trying all three modes with the set ups suggested) and every single photo when zoomed in on my computer was blurry.
Then yesterday in my yard I took some photos about 2-3 metres from some birds and a shrub (as practice) and they look fine on playback but once I zoomed in there is no detail and the photos are not sharp at all.

 

[Lisa Zee]

@Lisa Zee : I also have the Sigma 150-600mm C lens. I have used it on my Z5 with FTZ-II adapter, as well as my D750 and previously with a D7000 body. The lens is fully compatible with any auto mode the Z body has, no different to use than the F-mount D750 and D7000.

I like to photograph birds in S-mode (shutter priority) because I want to be able to also catch them in flight as well as perched. I will be in S-mode, 1/1000 second or 1/800 second, and I like to set the ISO at 100 with auto ISO on. Fast speed to stop motion blur. The camera will select the right aperture to expose the photo, and also increase the ISO if the aperture is maxed-out. On the lens the focus selector switch has 3 positons. "MO" is Manual Override, which means you can grab the focus ring and manually adjust focus if the autofocus is missing your subject. I use that mode nearly all the time. When you do that, a feature called "focus peaking" becomes active in the camera and a highlight will be displayed around the part of the photo that is focused. So if you do that and make a highlight appear around your bird, or at least it's head, then you have focused the right thing.

Autofocus and making it work for you is a very long chapter in the book of photography. There are confusing modes and each is optimized for different styles of photos. Try to just learn some small bites at a time until you understand the bigger picture of what is going on.

It’s good to know you’ve had success using this lens. I tried S mode yesterday and the photos are still blurry. The Z50ii is not compatible with this lens in auto mode. Maybe the original Z5 is. As soon as the lens is attached, a message comes up on the viewfinder that it’s a non-cpu lens and can only be used in S, A or M mode.

I noticed that with this lens attached in M, S or A mode the camera viewfinder does not show the f-stop (it just shows the f and the area where the numbers should be are blank) so I have no way of knowing what it’s set at.

 

[Clovishound]

Sorry you are having this much trouble with your lens. Try going into the setup menu and input the data for this lens in the "Non CPU Lens Data" option. Here is the section of the manual that covers that. This may give you access to some of the features you currently cannot access.


Non cpu lens data

The only other thing I can think of is updating the firmware.

 

[BF Hammer]

Lisa, was the lens bought used? If so and a previous owner also had the Sigma dock, I could believe pretty easily that the focus was customized for another camera body. Or at least attempted and done poorly. It is something that can be done with the software, but I never had a reason to try that. I do have the dock and I just used it to update firmware (Nikon version only has 1 update over the years) and I customized the switch functions a little. At 1 time I had 3 Sigma lenses to use the dock with.

But this does not explain the aperture controls not working right. I have been reading through web searches related to this lens and the Z50, and I do not see anybody complain about your problems. They seem to indicate aperture control is normal. But that admittedly is not the Z50-II.

So I would conclude that the lens is faulty if you do not have similar problems with other F-mount lenses. I do not know if you are using the original FTZ or the FTZ-II. There is a firmware update to apply for the FTZ (ver 1.1) but the FTZ-II is unchanged to date.

 

[Lisa Zee]

Thanks Clovishound and BF Hammer for your advice and taking the time to respond, I really appreciate your help.
I’d already put the non-cpu lens data in so that’s not the issue. The only thing I haven’t tried is the Sigma dock to update the firmware. I’m using the FTZ not FTZ-II.
I just got the memory card for my Z7 so I can finally use it. I had a great day taking shots with the Nikon 24-200mm lens on it. I will try the Sigma and Nikon Micro on the Z7 tomorrow and see how it goes.
Thanks again

 

[Lisa Zee]

Ok, so I tried the Nikon AF-S Micro Nikkor 105mm 1:2.8 G ED on the Z7 and have the same issue, no f-stop showing on the viewfinder and blurry photos, even though they look sharp and focused through the viewfinder before I press the shutter.
So both lenses surely can’t be faulty and neither of the camera bodies are.
How do I update lens firmware?

I also noticed the lens adaper I have is F(G type) to Z. Could it be the wrong adapter and could that be the issue?
I still have so much to learn!. I bought second hand lenses to save some money but I wish now that I hadn’t. Pictured is the adapter I’m using.