Neat Kit Lens thought: For any VR/OIS Lens

K

Kholi

Section Moderator
It's not really a trick, but pretty nifty and I'm sure it'll come in handy. So if you've ever seen one of these things: http://cgi.ebay.com/CANON-TAMRON-F-1-4x-AF-TELE-CONVERTER-MC4-NEAR-MINT_W0QQitemZ270369446686QQcmdZViewItemQQptZCamera_Lenses?hash=item270369446686&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1205|66%3A2|65%3A12|39%3A1|240%3A1318|301%3A1|293%3A1|294%3A50

I've got one of them and it's been collecting some SERIOUS dust in my closet. I decided to drag it on out today and experiment a bit. The reason being was that I didn't have any Nikon lens with me over 105mm in length, the KIT lens, mang.

You lose a bit of light, sharpness, etc, but it's not like the kit lens is all that sharp to begin with. But here's what I totally forgot.

So that 1.4x tele extender turns your 18~105mm Kit Lens into a what...

1.4 x 18-105mm = 25 - 147mm... that's not a lot. You can get a 2x extender and get more, which is probably what I'll do but THAT isn't the point. Here's the neat thing:

The Converter still has the AF/AI pins, so all of the functions carry over. That means VR does as well. Not only THAT, but Aperture priority still works as well. So...

Now I have a 25 - 147mm/3.5~5.6 (roughly) VR zoom lens instead of just an 18~105. For those of you keeping your D90's, grabbing some tele-extenders for your VR Kit Lens and using it on the long end with the VR Employed might sound really tasty!

A 2x extender gets you, duh, 36 ~ 210mm VR lens at a small investment. And those telephoto video shots won't be as terrible handheld. Probably won't have to do this with the GH-1, but I might anyway just to have a very long VR Telephoto.

Just thought I'd share.
 
it says it supports af, with built in motors i presume, and there definitely some connectors there, but does it work with "digital" lenses? the worst problem with those is that you lose two stops of light, so that already slow zoom of yours now becomes something resembling welding glasses in brightness. good for sunshine but little else.

/matt
 
mattsand said:
it says it supports af, with built in motors i presume, and there definitely some connectors there, but does it work with "digital" lenses? the worst problem with those is that you lose two stops of light, so that already slow zoom of yours now becomes something resembling welding glasses in brightness. good for sunshine but little else.

/matt
Click to expand...

It's actually not too bad indoors, Mattias. There's a video in the other thread (http://www.vimeo.com/4087417) of the adapter on the kit lens @ full telephoto and that's all natural light. Wasn't trying my hardest to get a good clean image but with a little light, to be honest, it's adequate, more so when you add the benefits of VR + Handheld.

At least to me. You try it out if you get the time to see what you think?

So far everything works perfect. Auto Focus between two lenses (105/2.8 Macro Nikkor), VR, All readouts etc. Of course it doesn't compensate for what the adapter loses but still.

I'd be willing to try out the 18-200 VR lens now, myself. Mostly because you wouldn't have to go through an adapter to get to the 200 end and the 200 end would be 5.6

Tsk. Wish I could afford the 70-200 VR Nikon.
 
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