I was desperate to have a super-telephoto lens ever since 2007. The options were limited (and expensive). I wasn’t happy with the image quality of zoom lenses such as the 50-500 mm (yes, that’s correct—fifty to five hundred!) But honestly, I couldn’t afford even the most ordinary lens of the time.
I got more desperate as the years piled on.
Sometime in the year 2013, I became aware that Nikon’s older manual focus lenses (AiS lenses) are compatible with present-day Nikon DSLR cameras—and even Canon DSLR cameras—if used with an AiS to EOS mount adapter! Did you know that?
Now, these lenses don’t auto-focus. Still, some of these lenses are as good as any contemporary lens.
So I purchased a Nikon 500 mm F/4 P IF-ED AiS mount lens (this lens was launched in 1988 and discontinued in 2002). I used it on my Canon 50D DSLR with an AiS to EOS adapter. This adapter had a focus confirmation chip stuck on it. So if I selected a single focus point on the camera body and brought it in focus, a red led light lit up—confirming that whatever is overlapping with that one point is in focus (how cool is that!)
The setup was fully functional except for two or three drawbacks—the lens swivelled around the camera body by about a millimeter. This was because the adapter didn’t replace the Nikon mount, it just sat over it.
The Canon 50D is rated at just 6.3 fps and its buffer is said to hold 15 RAW images—but out on the field, it was much less efficient.
So I purchased a used Nikon D300 camera. This was Nikon’s flagship DX-format sensor camera at one point in time. It’s amazing how much camera sensors have improved since—images made with an ISO rating of 800 or over on a D300 were useless due to high levels of digital noise.
One week later I traveled to the Thar Desert to photograph peacocks and Indian gazelles. This was one of the first photos that I made with the 500 mm lens on the D300 body.
This was a significant experience for me as a photographer.