Nikon 50mm 1.2 AIS

[HayPhoto_ca]

I went to a Flickr meet here in Ottawa where someone had a Noct-Nikkor 58mm f/1.2 AI-S. Whoever had it shot it on someone's D3.

sample image here: DOF on Flash on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

and yes it's a photo of me

I took that picture, although sadly that wasn't my D3.

The 58mm f/1.2 is the more expensive version of the 50mm because of the front element was hand ground (pin-points light exactly). Which is useful in astrophotography or in shots where you have points of light.

On Pro-Camera (such as the D3) they have an indicator on if your too far or too close in your focus, which is useful as with a D80 or other lower level cameras only have a dot, and the DOF is around a sheet of paper for a lot of shots where you don't hit the hyper-focal length.

Another example is here (on my D80)... note its full resolution image.

 

[Garbz]

Hyper focal and f/1.2 are not words that normally come into the same thread

The 58mm f/1.2 has an aspherical front element, this was almost unheard of at the time since they could not be machined. HayPhoto is right, these were hand crafted to extreme tolerances which is why it fetches more second hand than Canon's 50mm f/1.2 does new.

 

[HayPhoto_ca]

Quite Right, if you want more info on the Noct-Nikkor, I'd suggest going to this site, its a small website I set up with a quick review (i really need to update this) and a link to some other external reviews around the internet.