GH2 Nikon 50 1.4 G on a GH2 - is Novoflex the way to go?

O

OldCorpse

Rockin the Boat
My wife has the Nikon 50mm f/1.4 G for her photography, and I was thinking of seizing this away from her for the GH2. Unfortunately, it's not a D, but a G - so my question is if I get the Novoflex adapter, will it work with the GH2? If I have the G and the Novoflex, is there any advantage to having the D instead of the G? If so, I might trade it in :)
 
Somebody else will have the proper answer about Nikon, but for the price of Novoflex adapter you might be able to get a Minolta MD 50 f1.4 or Yashica ML 50 f1.4 lens. Adapters for those are 20 dollars each, and your wife will still have a lens. Both lenses are as good as equivalent Nikon, and some would argue they are even better. Even cheaper lenses are MD 50 f1.7 and ML 50 f1.7. They are a steal for the quality they offer. I think there should be a law that required asking more money for these lenses.
 
Thanks, guys. Aki, I have to buy a Nikon-m43 adapter anyway, because I have a bunch of Nikon mount lenses (erm, my wife has), and I'd like to use them on the GH2. But that's interesting that you think the Minolta or Yashica 50mm 1.4 are better than the Nikon 50mm 1.4 G - I always thought the Nikon was pretty outstanding... of course, I never compared it to other 50mm, so you may have a point. Hmm.

Gary, that looks interesting. Hopefully it works as well as the Canon ones.
 
I just picked up the Nikon 50mm 1.4 D off ebay, just arrived today and I'm loving this thing. Definitely a different look than the g, but it all depends on what you're going for. The D definitely has some added motion blur from what I can tell, the G seems to bring out a bit more detail. For "cinematic" type stuff, definitely leaning towards the D, but that's just me.
 
I have an MD 50mm 1.7 minolta with an MD to 4/3 adapter. When I put it on my GH2 in cinema mode I have control of the manual aperture (I can see it change in the view finder) but when I put it in still picture mode i can't. What am I doing wrong? Thanks.
 
shadowProd said:
I have an MD 50mm 1.7 minolta with an MD to 4/3 adapter. When I put it on my GH2 in cinema mode I have control of the manual aperture (I can see it change in the view finder) but when I put it in still picture mode i can't. What am I doing wrong? Thanks.
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In Manual still picture mode the camera compensates for the image brightness in the display by increasing gain when you stop the lens down. Hence you see a constant brightness in the display. You could take a picture and see the true exposure. There could be other ways to deal with this, though.

I have let it be like this, because the display image is what the camera thinks +-0 exposure should look like. Then if I see that value change in the display, I already have a rather good estimation how the image will look like. The display is too small, so several images usually need to be taken with different aperture or shutter speed or ISO setting.
 
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Those adapters work really well. I was renting nikon glass for a while and I used it on the Tokina and some 50mm Nikons until I picked up some FD lenses. These cheap adapters do the trick on manual lenses, but then again I've not used the expensive ones... but since the cheaper ones do the trick, why should I switch.?
 
OldCorpse said:
Thanks, guys. Aki, I have to buy a Nikon-m43 adapter anyway, because I have a bunch of Nikon mount lenses (erm, my wife has), and I'd like to use them on the GH2. But that's interesting that you think the Minolta or Yashica 50mm 1.4 are better than the Nikon 50mm 1.4 G - I always thought the Nikon was pretty outstanding... of course, I never compared it to other 50mm, so you may have a point. Hmm.

Gary, that looks interesting. Hopefully it works as well as the Canon ones.
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Yashica ML lenses are basically Contax Zeiss lenses branded as Yashica. Minolta did lens design and built lenses for Leica in the old days. From the legacy lenses both are as good or better than comparable Nikon or Canon FD, but of course newer lenses have better coating at least. Yashica and Minolta don't have the same name reckognition, though. The third "dead" camera and lens brand is the Konica Hexanon, but they have become a mini cult for still photographers now and prices are appreciating.
 
Since this subject was brought up (could have been me, though), I take the liberty to illustrate what I mean. This first product photos were taken with a Minolta MD 28 mm f2.8 @ f2.8 (wide open): http://www.fourseasonshd.com/cgi-bin/csvsearch.pl?db=db3&tp=tp10&search=atx3570f28sn8509633

The next product photos were taken in similar conditions with a Canon FD 28 f2.8 @ f2.8 (wide open): http://www.fourseasonshd.com/cgi-bin/csvsearch.pl?db=db3&tp=tp10&search=md50f2sn1988468

The Minolta 28 seems to deliver that pro-photo look at full aperture straight from the camera file, whereas the Canon images look a bit washed out (still good, though). Similar results have always resulted when I have compared these lenses. It is my opinion that Minolta and Yashica were the japanese legacy lens giants (together with Konica) who partnered with Zeiss and Leica. Nikon and Canon were the contenders. Nikon and Canon survived the tougher economic climate of the early 90'ies for being able to get the same money for lower cost products. But that's just my theory, albeit a good one.
 
Why an expensive Nikon Novoflex for a G ? A simple 25$ "Chinese" does the same. I use for my Nikon G as well as for Minolta Rokkor lenses, chinese adapters on my Gh1/Gh2.
 
i use a novoflex now.
i used to use the chinese ones and theyre not entirely reliable. lenses tend to play and the adapter doesnt last long.
lenses on the vnovoflex has no play. fits tight.. but not tight enough to damage the lens.
it may have cost me $200 but its worth every penny. my only complain is the aperture ring is too smooth.. if i accidentally touch it, it tends to move out of place :\

Now if you prefer a cheap adapter that you would replace every so often sure go ahead.
 
dcloud said:
i use a novoflex now.
i used to use the chinese ones and theyre not entirely reliable. lenses tend to play and the adapter doesnt last long.
lenses on the vnovoflex has no play. fits tight.. but not tight enough to damage the lens.
it may have cost me $200 but its worth every penny. my only complain is the aperture ring is too smooth.. if i accidentally touch it, it tends to move out of place :\

Now if you prefer a cheap adapter that you would replace every so often sure go ahead.
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Funny, my cheap adapters have lasted me over a year and still going strong. I think everyone's experience with these tend to vary, so you can't judge based on one person.

I also only buy adapters from companies with names I've heard of before (such as rainbow imaging and fotodiox), since they have good feedback from users here and a name to uphold. I wouldn't trust ebay sellers with no name on a generic product.
 
Truth be told, I would have preferred if my wife bought the Nikon 50mm f/1.8G instead of the f/1.4G. A friend of mine has the 1.8G and I played around with it on his Nikon, and preferred it to the 1.4 at every aperture, including the 1.4 vs the 1.8 - the image is just too soft at 1.4, so I wonder how useful it is even if it can deal with lower light. Of course, I have no idea how the 1.8 would be on the GH2 for video, so I guess that's kinda moot. Plus, I was thinking of picking it up for stills for the Nikon, but I see it's sold out... when the re-supply and it's still $220 or so, I'll pick one up, but for the Nikon D300 stills, not for video, but as long as I have it, I might experiment with it on video.
 
M. Gilden said:
Funny, my cheap adapters have lasted me over a year and still going strong. I think everyone's experience with these tend to vary, so you can't judge based on one person.

I also only buy adapters from companies with names I've heard of before (such as rainbow imaging and fotodiox), since they have good feedback from users here and a name to uphold. I wouldn't trust ebay sellers with no name on a generic product.
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i bought the rainbow imaging one and another chinese one. both has different play on different lenses. on one lens it has too much play, on others its tight.

novoflex is tight on any of my lenses
 
I think it also depends on what you will be doing. I decided to get one of the more expensive adapters when I moved up from some FDs to a couple of Nikon zooms. The main reason was I didn't want to mess with play in the lens or follow focus issues in a production environment. Also, the reviews on the cheaper ones seemed to run from good to bad for the same brand, making me think the quality isn't consistant. (I do have a fotodiox FD adapter that is a little loose but works pretty good.) After spending a bit of money on the lenses I didn't want to take any chances. I ended up with the Novaflex. I posted my thoughts on it here http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthrea...h-MTF-Novoflex-amp-Adaptimax-Nikon-G-adapters I also just ordered a cheap Rainbow Image Nikon G - EOS adapter that will be used on my old 30D mainly for an occasional timelapse shot. In that case the adapter wont get much use and I just needed something to hold the lens on and couldn't justify a higher cost one for that.
 
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