Nikon: What lens work on what?

[shootermcgee]

Hi guys, I have some knowledge on sensor sizes but I couldn't see anywhere about swapping lenses from DX to FX and vice-versa.

Okay I have had some varying advice. First off I was told that any lens would work on my D3100 but lately I had a salesman telling me that fx lenses won't work on a DX body. I was asking about a 12-24mm nikon lens and he said it wouldn't work as it would hit the sensor if I tried to install it. So my first question is; Will a fx lens work on a DX body?

Also he said that the DX lenses won't work on the FX bodies. Is this true? I see the new D800 will allow DX lenses but will only be able to be used at 15.4MP and will be at 1.5 times crop. So it defeats the purpose of the D800. So what about the other full frames, is it the same outcome?

 

[bhop]

You can use any Nikon F-Mount lens safely on any Nikon camera. Any FX lens will work fine on a DX body. Any DX lens will technically work on an FX body, but it will vignette horribly in most cases.

see here dx on a fx (film camera):

Feed Me by bhop, on Flickr

Actually.. I take that back, that's just for film cameras...

dslrs recognize the dx format, so, as far as the DX on the d800, d3, d4, and d700, yes, it will be at a lower mp level, and yes that does defeat the purpose of a full frame sensor IMO, although on the D800 dx at 15mp seems like it'd be perfectly useable.

 

[Patriot]

You also don't want to touch non-AI lens if your going to get older lens, AI, AI-S, and AF lens are the lens you want. If you try to install a Non-AI lens it can damage your camera or get stuck permanently. There are some cases where they will work on your D3100, so check your camera's manual as it has all the lens that will work on it.

 

[Derrel]

FX lenses work on most NIkon cameras. For the complete chart of Nikon Lens Compatibility, please see Ken Rockwell's excellent and comprehensive chart here:Nikon Lens Compatibility

It is NOT TRUE that one can use "any" Nikon lens on "any" Nikon camera; that could be disastrous if one uses a pre-AI Nikkor lens on say, a D70,D80,D90 for example.

The "baby Nikons" D40,D40x,D60,D3000,D3100,D3200,D5000,and D5100 however CAN USE ANY NIKON F-mount lens (except invasive fisheyes), with varying degrees of their full feature set.

 

[KmH]

but lately I had a salesman telling me that fx lenses won't work on a DX body. Total, still steaming, BS.

I was asking about a 12-24mm nikon lens and he said it wouldn't work as it would hit the sensor if I tried to install it. More total, steaming, BS.

Also he said that the DX lenses won't work on the FX bodies. Is this true?
No. That is not true.

Cross that salesman off your - List of people whose information you can trust.
By the way.
The complete user's manual for your D3100 is a PDF file on the disk that came with the camera. Nikon doesn't include a hard copy of the user's manual with that camera.

If you understood how your camera worked, you would know that there is a reflex mirror and shutter curtains in front of the image sensor. (DSLR - Digital Single Lens Reflex)

It may be that the salesman heard about how Canon's EF-S lenses (DX equivelent) would interfere with the reflex mirror movement, if they could be mounted on Canon EF camera bodies (FX equivelent).

 

[jake337]

You also don't want to touch non-AI lens if your going to get older lens, AI, AI-S, and AF lens are the lens you want. If you try to install a Non-AI lens it can damage your camera or get stuck permanently. There are some cases where they will work on your D3100, so check your camera's manual as it has all the lens that will work on it.

You can have these lens AI'D to work just fine.

The lens one really, really wants to watch out for are those old, pescy, invasive fisheyes which will damage your sensor.

 

[nmoody]

Hello fellow D3100 owner. If you want to keep it simple, stick to AF-S lenses. These ones are made in the same generation as our camera and include focus motors. Our D3100's dont have focus motors in them, so if we use some of the older lenses we will need to manually focus using the lenses focus ring each time.

As for FX lenses they sure will fit our camera, just like I said above stick to the current generation if you dont want to worry about focusing. I actually plan on buying one over the next year or so.

DX will fit on FX, but your pictures wont take up the full frame. That is unless you change the Focal length inside the FX camera to accommodate the lens. Typically though DX lenses are not as optically good as the FX ones, for this reason most FX camera users dont bother with them.

I was pretty sure the Nikon 10-24mm f/3.5-4.5G ED AF-S was a DX lens. Unless it was a different one you were looking at.

 

[shootermcgee]

Thanks for the reply's everyone. It's just good to check these things after hearing contradicting information. It's annoying to know that if I ever did spend money on nicer equipment it will kinda become useless when moving up or I could use it as a second camera. So I won't worry about that until I can take better pictures and outgrow what I have now (could be a while).

Oh and KmH I meant the lens would hit the mirror not the sensor, my bad. Thanks for the advice too.