Dx lens on Fx Camera

[mdq8]

I have my Nikon D5100 camera Dx lenses, if i use them on a Nikon D750 full frame camera, would it be any different regarding image quality,sharpness, size..... ??

 

[Strodav]

Just try it, but here's my experience. When I put a DX lens on a FF camera in FF mode there is a clear image in the center of the frame inside a black circle extending to the borders of the frame, so the DX lens does not cover the whole FX frame. You can put your FF body in DX mode and the image will be fine. The pixel density of a FF body in DX mode is generally less than the pixel density of a DX body, so I believe IQ will be less than that on a FF body in FF mode. The D750 in DX mode uses 10.3mp (3936 x 2624) and the D5100 is 16.2mp (4928 x 3264).

 

[480sparky]

Shooting in DX mode doesn't utilize the entire full-frame sensor, so you'll have fewer pixels to work with.

 

[Lonnie1212]

Good thread! I guess I won't count on using DX lenses with a full frame camera.

 

[Solarflare]

I use my circumcised Nikkor AF 10.5mm f2.8 DX Fisheye on my D750. I have disabled the DX automatic so its short as FX. Allows me to freely choose the aspect ratio, and you dont use a Fisheye lens if you want maximum resolution anyway. Only disadvantage is that its not a fully circular fisheye; for that one one would need a little bit larger sensor. Maybe I'll have a Fujifilm GFX someday for that.

I also used the AF-S 35mm f1.8 DX lens once for giggles. Its pretty okay. If you crop to 16:9 or 4:3 or whatever, the dark corners are gone, so its very useable. Also extremely compact on a FX camera. Really the only reason I dont really use it more often is that I have a Zeiss Distagon 35mm f2 ZF and that lens is clearly better than the otherwise surprisingly good AF-S 35mm f1.8 DX.

There are more DX lenses which work pretty nice on FX sensors. IIRC the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 can be used as a 16mm f2.8 on FX quite nicely, or at least some people claim so, I personally dont own that lens.

Likewise if I ever get my hands on a Fujifilm GFX and a Nikon F to Fujifilm G adapter, I will probably play around with all my Nikkors on that, even if I dont expect them to perform as good as the extremely high quality Fujinon GF lenses which have been optimized for this task.

I have no qualms of experimenting with this around, but I wouldnt recomment to anyone to not have native lenses for your sensor size.

 

[RVT1K]

Some full frame cameras can detect a crop-sensor lens and will automatically crop.

 

[480sparky]

Some full frame cameras can detect a crop-sensor lens and will automatically crop.

Some....can? How about All.... do by default.

 

[RVT1K]

Some full frame cameras can detect a crop-sensor lens and will automatically crop.

Some....can? How about All.... do by default.

I only own two and speak for those. I'm not familiar with what other makes or models do.

My D4 offers the option to auto-crop for a DX lens or to choose an image area.

 

[Solarflare]

Well, if you are invested into the Canon system, then you cannot mount EF-S lenses, simply due to their physical design.

EF-S lenses are designed for a mirror thats deeper into the camera, because on a crop camera that mirror can be smaller due to the smaller sensor. Thus if you would be able to use EF-S lenses with a full frame DSLR, they would destroy the mirror if you try to take a picture.

Thus Canon DSLR indeed have no mechanism that would put the camera into crop mode if a lens made for crop would be mounted.

You can mount them though, if they are third party. Tamron etc usually dont redesign their lenses individually for the different mounts; they make one optical design and use it for Nikon F, Canon EF, and possibly more, only chaning the mount section of the lens between systems. Thus they all dont use the theoretical [small] advantages one could exploit for having more room on a crop camera, and thus you can saftely mount these crop lenses on a full frame Canon.

 

[480sparky]

Some full frame cameras can detect a crop-sensor lens and will automatically crop.

Some....can? How about All.... do by default.

I only own two and speak for those. I'm not familiar with what other makes or models do.

My D4 offers the option to auto-crop for a DX lens or to choose an image area.

AFAIK, all Nikons are set to a factory-default of detecting DX glass and going to Crop mode. You can over-ride this to DX mode all the time or FX all the time.

 

[Strodav]

FWIW, grabbed a D800 36mp FF body and an 18-140mm f/3.5-5.6 DX kit lens, went out in the backyard and took shots at 18, 24, 35, 50, 70, and 140mm. Opened them in LR and exported them at 1200x800 pixels. No other processing was done. Auto-DX was off.

 

[Designer]

Good thread! I guess I won't count on using DX lenses with a full frame camera.

I don't know why you would want to. Anyway, there aren't a ton of DX lenses, so I wouldn't even think it is something to consider.

 

[nate liv]

I ordered a 36MP FF Sony A7r and a FF 24-70 Leitz zoom when they were announced in October. The camera came, the lens is yet to be released, it’s coming soon.

I’ve been shooting with Sony E mount lenses for the NEX crop frame series. There is a similar setting on the Sony where I can crop down to the C sized image area at 16MP, I found that if I shoot with the vignette showing then crop the image in Lightroom to remove the shadowed edges I get an image of about 21 MP. I just compose toward the center of the frame and crop the edges. If I’m careful it works. Most of the time I get the image I plan to see. My experience is similar to yours with variables of focal length & aperture changing the size of the vignette.

I’m using 2nd generation Sony E mount lenses & the quality is fine. I’m looking forward to the arrival of the Leitz lens.