Classic lens design
Written: Jun 30 '02 (Updated Aug 30 '02)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Compact, sharp, matches the FM3A, curved diaphragm blades for good out-of-focus highlights
Cons: Expensive, relatively slow maximum aperture, small size makes the focusing knob difficult to handle
The Bottom Line: This lens is marketed to people who want a retro chic, ultra-compact lens for a FM3A, but nonetheless excels optically. I would recommend the 60mm f/2.8D AF Micro-Nikkor, however.
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| majid's Full Review: Nikon AI-S 45mm f/2.8P Lens |
I bought this lens at the same time as my Nikon FM3A body, and indeed both were introduced at the same time as a matching pair. It is a manual focus lens but also has a chip that allows its use with metering in the most recent bodies.
The 4 element Tessar design it uses is exactly a hundred years old now, having been designed by Paul Rudolph at Zeiss in 1902. It was also the lens design for my first camera, a Zeiss Ikon Contaflex, so there was an element of nostalgia in my purchase.
Unfortunately, the lens is very expensive, at $330 street price, it is actually more expensive than the "real thing", the Zeiss T* Tessar 45mm f/2.8 manual focus.
The lens is very compact, specially if you omit the matching neutral filter and lens hood supplied with it. Unfortunately, this also means the focusing ring is somewhat difficult to grasp.
Optical quality is very good, with excellent sharpness in the corners. Then again, this isn't amazing, as 50mm lenses are usually among the sharpest in any manufacturer's lineup, and making a 45mm lens that is sharp at f/2.8 is no longer a challenge as it could have been a century ago. The modest (for a normal lens) aperture actually gives it better sharpness than the 50mm f/1.4. The rounded diaphragm blades help give this lens excellent blur effect for backgrounds ("bokeh"). I have some samples available at:
http://www.majid.info/radio/stories/2002/08/25/aTaleOfThreeLenses.html
This lens is clearly a premium designer item and not the best value in the Nikon line, since an auto-focus 50mm f/1.8 can be bought for about $70 and the excellent Macro 55mm f/2.8 (manual) or 60mm f/2.8 (auto-focus) are about the same price and are more versatile. I recently bought my father a D100 as a birthday gift, and the lens I bought to go with it (my father is using a F3 and doesn't have any AF lenses) is the 60mm f/2.8 Micro-Nikkor AF.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
majid
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Member: Fazal Majid
Location: San Francisco
Reviews written: 53
Trusted by: 5 members
About Me:
I'm the CTO of an Internet startup
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