50mm Nikon F-Mount Lens Recommendations

[Brian Iannone]

I'm looking for a sharp 50mm Nikon F-mount lens to use in a "dangerous" (for the lens) experiment. I'd like to find something the sub-$500 range so that when it does go "poof," it won't be too big of an issue. Any thoughts on Nikon's 50mm f/1.4G? While a fast lens would be nice, a large aperture is not necessarily needed. I'm mainly concerned with sharpness.

(And just in case you're wondering, any damage caused to equipment during this "experiment" won't be covered by my insurance policy; which is why I'm looking for a possibly "single-use," but still optically worth-shooting-with lens.)

 

[Brian Iannone]

For some strange, unknown reason, I seemed to have forgotten during the time I wrote my post above that I just bought a Nikon 50mm f/1.4G a few days ago. Would anyone here say that there's a sharper, manual lens available for around the same price?

 

[Robert Hart]

Brian.

Nikon lenses are fairly tough within reason, especially some of the older ones.

Therefore anything which is going to stress the lens mechanically, subject the glassware to destructive thermal shock or hazard the optics like abrasive or chemical envronments, stands a good chance of harming your camera also. The sensor OPLF/IR assembly is not something I would be inclined to expose to severe mechanical or thermal stresses.

For thermal shock, abrasive and chemical risks to the front element and optical coating, a clear screw-in glass filter will be helpful. If the issue is being in a temporary harmful gaseous or fluid environment, bagging the lens or giving it a generous coat of hairsetting spray laquer after you have set exposure and focus, to seal the gaps for a short period may be helpful. For thermal shock, again the front filter glass will be helpful plus a tight wrap of cottonwool around the lens barrel after exposure and focus have been set.

I am assuming your experiment is with the lens only and not with a RED One/EPIC/SCARLETT camera attached. If you are attaching one of these cameras, I would sure like your discretionary spend resource.

Within the price range, the lens you have chosen may be as good as you will get. I would favour lighting for f3.5-f5.6 for best image.

If you are going to use the Nikon lens as a projection lens, you may find that actual cinema 35mm projection lenses will suit you better. With cinemas going digital, these may not be so expensive to get hold of from eBay and are purposed to deal with heat. 16mm cinema projector lenses were standard at 50mm focal length, so if frame area is not an issue, one of those might be an option and affordable. These do not have an aperture control so if you want to control light with the lens, you will need to cut rings with varying diameters to shove inside the back of those lenses to approximate the function of an iris.

 

[Michael Mayda]

The 1.4 G is an excellent lens. I have used it mostly for stills with D-800. Hard to imagine a better lens at thiis fl and aperture.

 

[Alan Peterson]

The 50/1.8 AI-S makes a great image and sells for a pittance. If you don't need anything faster than that, it can't be beat for IQ and price.

 

[Lee Saxon]

I'd hate to see you destroy your 50 1.4G! Buy a 50 1.8G. According to Roger Cicala's MTF results (center/average on a D800), you won't sacrifice sharpness:

Zeiss ZF.2 50mm f/2.0 Makro Planar (1087/1022@f/5.6)
Zeiss ZF.2 50mm f/1.4 (1137 / 838 @ f/5.6)
Nikon 50mm f/1.2 AI-S (1049 / 745 @ f/4 – note: the corners are rather soft)
Nikon 50mm f/1.4 G (1073 / 889 @ f/5.6)
Nikon 50mm f/1.8 G (1045 / 940 @ f/5.6)

 

[Brian Iannone]

Brian.

Nikon lenses are fairly tough within reason, especially some of the older ones.

Therefore anything which is going to stress the lens mechanically, subject the glassware to destructive thermal shock or hazard the optics like abrasive or chemical envronments, stands a good chance of harming your camera also. The sensor OPLF/IR assembly is not something I would be inclined to expose to severe mechanical or thermal stresses.

For thermal shock, abrasive and chemical risks to the front element and optical coating, a clear screw-in glass filter will be helpful. If the issue is being in a temporary harmful gaseous or fluid environment, bagging the lens or giving it a generous coat of hairsetting spray laquer after you have set exposure and focus, to seal the gaps for a short period may be helpful. For thermal shock, again the front filter glass will be helpful plus a tight wrap of cottonwool around the lens barrel after exposure and focus have been set.

I am assuming your experiment is with the lens only and not with a RED One/EPIC/SCARLETT camera attached. If you are attaching one of these cameras, I would sure like your discretionary spend resource.

Within the price range, the lens you have chosen may be as good as you will get. I would favour lighting for f3.5-f5.6 for best image.

If you are going to use the Nikon lens as a projection lens, you may find that actual cinema 35mm projection lenses will suit you better. With cinemas going digital, these may not be so expensive to get hold of from eBay and are purposed to deal with heat. 16mm cinema projector lenses were standard at 50mm focal length, so if frame area is not an issue, one of those might be an option and affordable. These do not have an aperture control so if you want to control light with the lens, you will need to cut rings with varying diameters to shove inside the back of those lenses to approximate the function of an iris.

Thank you very much for the thoughts Robert! Unfortunately, if something goes wrong with this shoot, then the lens will be falling out of the sky into a river of lava (literally), so there's no way to protect it really. I, of course, won't be using it with an EPIC/Scarlet as my budget doesn't allow for sending RED cameras into streams of lava (lol). It'll be used with a Nikon D3200.

Though, I am curious now. For shooting in gaseous/fluid environments, I noticed you said that bagging the lens or giving it a coat of hair setting spray would help. Are there specialized bags for this or would just any store-bought bag work?

The 1.4 G is an excellent lens. I have used it mostly for stills with D-800. Hard to imagine a better lens at thiis fl and aperture.

I've had the 50mm f/1.4G for a few days and I am quite impressed considering its price. I too use it with a D800 and I must say, the images are surprisingly sharp. I just last night tried running some of the images through DxO's Optics Pro and it did quite a nice job of gradually sharpening the image from the center out to the edges. Quite impressive indeed.

The 50/1.8 AI-S makes a great image and sells for a pittance. If you don't need anything faster than that, it can't be beat for IQ and price.

Is the 50mm f/1.8 AI-S no longer manufactured? I can't seem to find it online.

I'd hate to see you destroy your 50 1.4G! Buy a 50 1.8G. According to Roger Cicala's MTF results (center/average on a D800), you won't sacrifice sharpness:

Zeiss ZF.2 50mm f/2.0 Makro Planar (1087/1022@f/5.6)
Zeiss ZF.2 50mm f/1.4 (1137 / 838 @ f/5.6)
Nikon 50mm f/1.2 AI-S (1049 / 745 @ f/4 – note: the corners are rather soft)
Nikon 50mm f/1.4 G (1073 / 889 @ f/5.6)
Nikon 50mm f/1.8 G (1045 / 940 @ f/5.6)

Excellent list! Precisely what I'm looking for. Thank you Lee. I do love having multiple options.

I had just bought a 50mm f/1.4G for general shooting with, though I think I'll return that and get either a Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 or Makro-Planar f/2.

For this shoot though, I'll go with the Nikon 50mm f/1.8G.

 

[Alan Peterson]

Is the 50mm f/1.8 AI-S no longer manufactured? I can't seem to find it online.

Yes, this one's discontinued. You can pick it up used for around $60 on KEH or whichever used lens outlet you prefer, and smash it to pieces with no regrets.
The only 50mm AI-S you can buy new right now is the 50/1.2, which is quite a bit more expensive.

 

[Lee Saxon]

Excellent list! Precisely what I'm looking for. Thank you Lee. I do love having multiple options.

I had just bought a 50mm f/1.4G for general shooting with, though I think I'll return that and get either a Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 or Makro-Planar f/2.

Be careful about making decisions just based on MTF results. By copy-pasting a small section of an article, I deprived you of Roger's disclaimers that MTF results are not lens reviews and he is not a lens reviewer. He has a zillion copies of every camera and lens and publishes averages after testing multiples copies of each lens on multiple D800's, so his results are more useful than some people's, but they still don't tell the whole story.

Despite what those numbers tell us, my favorite lens on this list is the 50 1.2. It creates great sunstars and just has some difficult-to-define character that I love. The Zeiss 50 1.4, on the other hand, is a technically great lens that I find bland and characterless.