What are the Nikon lens legends?

[Bronson Dugnutt]

I just don't believe I can get a better 28mm optics anywhere for less than 10x the price.

Nikon: Imagine the 18.5mm f2.8 Pronea lens that never was.

 

[George Mann]

• 50mm f/2 Nikkor-H.C and the later and very closely related K and AI versions - Sometimes called the Japanese Summicron, it is a very good lens but every version of the later manual focus f/1.8 is better.

Better is subjective. I have owned all versions of the f1.8 only to dump them for multicoated f2's, because they render the scene more accurately.

 

[George Mann]

G lens don't have aperture rings so N90s and like will not work or any MF body.

The F90/N90 series works with G lenses in program and shutter priority modes.

 

[RLangham]

At any rate, I've never understood why there aren't more people who talk about the original Nikon normal prime for SLR's: the Nikkor-S Auto 5cm f/2. Sure, it was quickly replaced by a lens that is often considered superior, but come on, this is the lens that shipped with perhaps the most lauded and SLR of all time when it was first released. And it's good too.

 

[George Mann]

At any rate, I've never understood why there aren't more people who talk about the original Nikon normal prime for SLR's: the Nikkor-S Auto 5cm f/2. Sure, it was quickly replaced by a lens that is often considered superior, but come on, this is the lens that shipped with perhaps the most lauded and SLR of all time when it was first released. And it's good too.

This lens is legendary enough that soldiers dumped the lenses they normally used for these.

 

[Craig]

As do I. But there's something about the AF-S and G lenses that keeps them from being backwards compatible to a certain point. I just can't remember the details on it at the moment, but I know there was a reason I went for D lenses and nothing newer.

What version of AF lenses came before the D?

Prior to the D lenses they were just AF Nikkors. D used the focused distance for flash calculations. Makes no difference in ambient light shooting. The first generation AF Nikkors usually had a very narrow manual focus ring, the later versions and D typically had better focus rings.

The G lenses do not have an aperture ring, so can't be used on an F4 in manual or aperture priority modes.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

75-150mm f/3.5 Series E became legendary for its high image quality in spite of its low cost.

55mm f/3.5 micro became legendary for its high image quality.

180mm f/2.8 became legendary for its high image quality.

105mm f/2.5 became a legendary lens when Steve McCurry's photograph of the Afghan Girl appeared on the June 1985 cover of National Geographic.
let's add the E-series 50mm f/1.8 to the list for similar reasons.
85mm f/1.4 became legendary for its bokeh.

 

[awty]

The (non-exotic) Nikon manual focus F mount lenses that come to mind....

• 
  
• 200mm f/4 Nikkor ... pedestrian performance but every Vietnam War era photojournalist had one and a dedicated Nikon F body.

I think they might of just been compensating for something.

 

[film_man]

200mm f/2 G ED VRII.
Not sure if it is legendary because not as many have had it as have had the more common ones mentioned here, but it’s one of the best lenses Nikon ever made.

I think you'll find threads like this are more about waxing lyrical of the good old times of the F2, manual focus, 'nam and whatever other stuff. All this new G stuff you mention most people in photrio avoid like the plague because...well because.

I don't even know what a legendary lens is supposed to be like. Is it expensive? Then any VR supertele will do plus the odd rare thing like the 58/1.2. Does it have amazing performance? Well, I suppose the superteles will do too because I can't think of anything in SLR land that cannot be beat by something in M mount (which covers the rare and expensive part too). Or maybe legendary is rare? So well I think the 58/1.2 comes to mind, everything else you can find pretty easily. Maybe it is just who used it, I guess we'll just ring McCurry and ask what he used (which of course included the F90 and a 50/1.4 AF, hardly legendary mass produced stuff). Meh...

 

[mooseontheloose]

OMG, this is a dangerous thread for me right now. I'm currently in Tokyo, specifically to attend the World's Used Camera Fair - a goldmine of extremely high quality film cameras, lenses, accessories, and everything else you could think of. The Japanese definitely keep the best stuff for the local market - no excellent+++++ ratings here. In fact, there are no ratings on anything, compared to what you find in the shops. It's just assumed to be excellent or mint, and in full working condition. (That said, there is a junk section for really cheap cameras and lenses that people will buy for parts).

I got myself a very nice Nikon FM3A with a 50mm f/1.4 lens, but had no luck in finding the 105mm f/2.5 - I don't know if it's because they sold out faster than I could find them, or that not many sellers brought them (I want the AiS version). I similarly was looking for a 35mm lens, but they were pricier than I expected and I couldn't decide which one to go for. I've been happy with a 28/50 combo for years, but have thought of adding the 35 to my arsenal for times when I just want one lens to cover most situations. I'd love the 85mm as well, that's been a want for almost 20 years now, but it's probably a case of either/or with the 85 and the 105 - neither would be a main shooting lens for me, and I can't really justify the expense of having both.

A few photos from the fair (which goes all week): inspecting the soon-to-be-mine FM3a and 50mm on top of one of many Nikon cases, the 0.95 Canon lens (this was the cheapest one I found), and the last is what a lot of the camera cases looked like when they opened at 11, by the time I left around 2 p.m. many were half empty. A lot of people came here with suitcases (!) to fill up with gear - the Leica sections were always the most popular, but there was a nice selection of cameras from a variety of manufacturers (Alpa, Argus, Canon, Contax, Exakta, Kodak (stereo only), Leica, Nikon, Rollei, etc) in really beautiful condition, from mini micro cameras you could fit in the palm of your hand all the way up to large format (film holders too - very cheaply available in 4x5, 5x7, and 8x10). What was I saying again? Oh yeah, iconic Nikon lenses. I'll be watching this thread and/or referencing when I go back to the fair tomorrow or maybe every day this week.

 

[ChristopherCoy]

OMG, this is a dangerous thread for me right now. I'm currently in Tokyo, specifically to attend the World's Used Camera Fair - a goldmine of extremely high quality film cameras, lenses, accessories, and everything else you could think of. The Japanese definitely keep the best stuff for the local market - no excellent+++++ ratings here. In fact, there are no ratings on anything, compared to what you find in the shops. It's just assumed to be excellent or mint, and in full working condition. (That said, there is a junk section for really cheap cameras and lenses that people will buy for parts).

An ENTIRE used camera fair? I'm really not caring much for the Japanese right now. It's bad enough that everything on eBay is in Japan... now they have to taunt us with an entire FAIR? That's just rude.

 

[mooseontheloose]

An ENTIRE used camera fair? I'm really not caring much for the Japanese right now. It's bad enough that everything on eBay is in Japan... now they have to taunt us with an entire FAIR? That's just rude.

It’s held twice a year in October and February. This is the first time I’ve been able to attend, as I normal travel during Feb and have to work in October. JCH has a good video on YouTube about the last one:



Edit: watching this again I realized I bought my camera from the Nikon guy that many people don’t like. He was nice to me though!

 

[ChristopherCoy]

It’s held twice a year in October and February. This is the first time I’ve been able to attend, as I normal travel during Feb and have to work in October. JCH has a good video on YouTube about the last one:

I watched that one, as well as three others I found. Interesting stuff.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

My 35mm lens for my Nikonos IVa underwater camera is pretty unique being waterproof. It's extremely sharp.
Some samples: https://www.flickr.com/search/?sort...&tags=nikonos&user_id=55760757@N05&view_all=1
Note the lens has two knobs - one for focus and one for aperture. You install it upside down as shown in the picture so you don't have to turn the camera around laterally while underwater, only rotate it up over the top to see the settings.

 

[Kodachromeguy]

An ENTIRE used camera fair? I'm really not caring much for the Japanese right now. It's bad enough that everything on eBay is in Japan... now they have to taunt us with an entire FAIR? That's just rude.

Oh oh, shopping envy. I wish I were there to look for a late-vintage 5cm 3.5 Elmar. (thread mount).

 

[Jim Jones]

A lens that perhaps few really had a need for was the GN-Auto Nikkor 1:2.8 45mm. In the early 1970s I did a quick, but critical, test on maybe 30 of the best lenses for Leica and Nikon that I could get together. Four were sharper than any of the rest: Leica collapsing mount 50mm f/2.8 Elmar, Micro Nikkor-P Auto 1:3.5 55mm, EL-Nikkor 50mm 1:2.8, and that little GN-Nikkor. Perhaps most buyers were put off with the compromises Nikon made to accommodate flash photography of that time: a setting for flash guide number and an aperture that would adjust the exposure as the photographer focused the lens. The automatic focusing to aperture feature could be uncoupled for conventional manual focusing. It protruded only 4/5 inch from the camera body and weighed only 4.76 ounces. This meant that most cameras mounting it would be tail-heavy when suspended from a strap. I rarely used mine. One or two stops faster lens speeds made the mainline Nikkor 50mm lenses more versatile and they also felt more natural. Small as it was, it still didn't make a Nikon SLR a pocket camera.

 

[urnem57]

+1 for 85mm 1.4
+1 for Micro-Nikkor 55m

 

[Christiaan Phleger]

Ok you all asked for it;

First off, in no way shape or form does the Nikkor AF 50mm 1.8D or Not D qualify for Legendary Nikkor status. It just doesn't. I know its a fine normal, but an unfrosted strawberry off brand Pop-Tart is not the "finest pastry Ev-verh".
Legendary means legendary. That there is a cowboy and over there is the Lone Ranger.
This list is limited to the potentially achievable to shoot with.
In no particular order.

28mm f/2.8 Ai-s. Yep it is a great lens. Nikon wisely put its optical strengths into a superb consumer wide angle. How good? I tested one of my more thrashed sample (bay bargain auction from a former NY post shooter perfect glass trashed exterior) against an Otus 28mm, tripod same sensor. Nikkor at 5.6 looked like the Zeiss at f/2.8 which is saying its good if you know what that Otus does. I am more personally attached to the 28mm f/2 but I still have that beat up 2.8 version as a walkabout beater. The most 'common' lens on this list with more than 200,000 made its a fairly easy lens to try for yourself.

35mm f/1.4; I am partial to the radioactive ones but I've shot and owned the Ai-s. Yes, in these modern time there are many fast 35's that are amazing and while this wasn't the first faster 35mm it does have the optical chops that are now almost standard in a modern 35mm; Integrated multi-coating, floating elements, and rare exotic glass (early ones). Incredibly versatile, it offers a wide range of 'looks' from mid-day high desert black and white with f/11 and a yellow filter to wide open at 3 feet in low light shot on E-6. Tried either of those situations with the Nikkor 35mm f/1.4? You don't know what you've been missing. Cheap these days too.

85mm f/1.4 Ai-s. In my opinion (and a long one at that dear reader) Nikon looked at how pro users were using the *near legendary* 85mm f/1.8 H and made a dream lens; faster yet sharper, better performance close up and in backlight and faster focusing. Yes I know all about the Nikkor 85's and I have most of them and shot with the others, I love that focal length. The f/2 for its 'faults', the 1.8 H.C for the controllable glow, the AF 1.8 for lightness, speed, and low cost, the AF 1.4 Cream Machine etc, they are all great and Wonderfull. The Legendary 85mm in my opinion is the f/1.4 Ai-s; if it wasn't the first medium telephoto that had the floating element CRC but the performance gain from that inclusion meant that every Top fast 85mm would have now have it. It was released at a time before AF and before the release of the Nikkor the 80-200mm f/2.8 AF, and the 85mm f/1.4 Ai-s was a standard lens for daily assignment news shooters such as myself. In those days basketball shooters would sit behind the hoop, usually slightly to the right side, with an 85 for the easy lay-up/rebound shot. It gave a high probability for important action in a relative small space, and the f/1.4 Ai-s fast and smooth focus throw meant you could make the small focus adjustments needed, even when shooting in sequence. It was usable as an action lens at f/1.4 but you got a bit of focus margin with f/2-2.8 and the defocus was smooth so that if you were slightly off on an important play it would not be off putting when the photo hit the newsprint.
(For the other side of the court shooters would sometimes shoot a longer lens on another body. I occasionally would use a 300mm f/2.8 as well as a 180mm f/2.8 but I preferred the 135mm f/2; it was slightly looser in framing so I could follow the action and anticipate a steal easier and then if I was caught on the fast break return play without any time to switch to the 85mm I could still get a tight shot attempt of the play.) A bread and butter lens that did it all, sports, action, portraiture, weddings, low light, landscape, close-ups! in a robust sturdy package (the heaviest of the Nikkor 85's and for good reason). A very tough call between the Ai-s vs the AF-D if the reader has not either; many of the best qualities of the Ai-s are in the AF-D but in lighter lens with AF and the CPU. The Ai-s is slightly smaller but I use one or two extra thick 72mm filter rings as an additional hood extension with the HN-20.

Nikon 300mm f/2.8. It is arguable that the 400mm f/3.5 (and the 600mm f/5.6 which has the patent first) had more impact on the creation of the now standard telephoto design of Extra low Dispersion glass and the Internal Focussing but the Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 was the do-all fast telephoto that really started the 'trashcan on a stick' telephoto lens use. Before the Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 ED-IF there were a few heavy rare expensive 300mm lenses (Topcon, Nikkor H) but within a short time there was a 300mm 2.8 in pretty much every lens makers' line; Pentax, Leica (280mm), Olympus (splitting the difference with either the 250/2 or 350/2.8), Canon, Zeiss for Contax, Zeiss for Hasselblad(!), as well as the independents, Tamron (a fine optic), Sigma, Tokina and even the Arstat Russian version. A working lens that Nikon made >80,000 versions and still now makes perhaps 3000 a year and sells every single one of them.

The 80-200mm f/4.5 was an excellent lens for its time and steadily improved (and I'm including the more optimized f/4 Ai-s model as an extension of the 4.5 design). Before Nikon released this lens not many zooms were seen nor desired but after this lens a mid-length telephoto zoom would be a standard lens option. The lighter New Ai version is the best one especially as lighter weight travel lens on digital (although a case could be made for the f/4 in build quality).

We are all lucky that we live in a time where it is fairly easy to obtain lenses as good as these for sometimes bargain prices.

 

[BradS]

^^^ @RidingWaves , good stuff! Thanks.

 

[bdial]

If never done any critical comparisons, but I have some bitingly crisp negatives from 2 Nikkors in particular. Like @Alan Edward Klein , I’ve found the Nikonos 35mm to be very sharp. The other is the 50mm f/2 LTM rangefinder lens.
I don’t know if they qualify as legendary, but they produce very nice images.

 

[Craig]

Before the Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 ED-IF there were a few heavy rare expensive 300mm lenses (Topcon, Nikkor H) but within a short time there was a 300mm 2.8 in pretty much every lens makers' line;

Sort of depends on how you look at history if Nikon was first. In a way they were, as they made 110 lenses for the Japanese press photographers for the 1972 Sapporo Olympics, but there wasn't a version on sale until 1978.

Canon however, released the 300/2.8 Fluorite in February, 1974 and the fluorite is a superior material to optical glass for minimizing chromatic aberration. In contrast the Nikon lens for press use in 1972 didn't have ED elements, coated lenses, or even automatic aperture. In comparison to the Canon, it was a fairly crude lens; rushed into production for the olymipics. Nikon was very much playing catch up to Canon in the super tele offerings in the 70's, so for that reason I would not classify the Nikkor version as "legendary". Canon yes, Nikon no.

 

[Sirius Glass]

Sort of depends on how you look at history if Nikon was first. In a way they were, as they made 110 lenses for the Japanese press photographers for the 1972 Sapporo Olympics, but there wasn't a version on sale until 1978.

Canon however, released the 300/2.8 Fluorite in February, 1974 and the fluorite is a superior material to optical glass for minimizing chromatic aberration. In contrast the Nikon lens for press use in 1972 didn't have ED elements, coated lenses, or even automatic aperture. In comparison to the Canon, it was a fairly crude lens; rushed into production for the olymipics. Nikon was very much playing catch up to Canon in the super tele offerings in the 70's, so for that reason I would not classify the Nikkor version as "legendary". Canon yes, Nikon no.

Canon is part of a very large company with a lot of financial backing; Nikon is a small family held company without financial backing from a large corporation.

 

[BradS]

Sort of depends on how you look at history if Nikon was first. In a way they were, as they made 110 lenses for the Japanese press photographers for the 1972 Sapporo Olympics, but there wasn't a version on sale until 1978.

Canon however, released the 300/2.8 Fluorite in February, 1974 and the fluorite is a superior material to optical glass for minimizing chromatic aberration. In contrast the Nikon lens for press use in 1972 didn't have ED elements, coated lenses, or even automatic aperture. In comparison to the Canon, it was a fairly crude lens; rushed into production for the olymipics. Nikon was very much playing catch up to Canon in the super tele offerings in the 70's, so for that reason I would not classify the Nikkor version as "legendary". Canon yes, Nikon no.

it’s not a zero sum game - both can be legendary. Further, a canon lens cannot be a legendary Nikon lens...which is what this thread is about.

 

[GarageBoy]

300 f2.0 - no one else even bothered to make one

Also, the 105 uv is another unique Nikon lens

 

[E. von Hoegh]

The (non-exotic) Nikon manual focus F mount lenses that come to mind....

• 28mm f/2.8 AIS Nikkor - probably apocryphal but the story I heard was that Corporate management gave design engineers free reign on this design. There are a couple related Nikkors that are as good - the 24mm f/2.8 AIS Nikkor for example.
  
• 50mm f/2 Nikkor-H.C and the later and very closely related K and AI versions - Sometimes called the Japanese Summicron, it is a very good lens but every version of the later manual focus f/1.8 is better.
• 105mm f/2.5 Nikkor-P.C and all of its manual focus decedents. Again, a spectacular lens. Try one and you'll know why it is legendary. I cannot think of anything that even comes close...maybe the contemporaneous Pentax 105mm f/2.8 Super Takumar and Super-Multi-Coated Takumar ?
• 200mm f/4 Nikkor ... pedestrian performance but every Vietnam War era photojournalist had one and a dedicated Nikon F body.

The 50 H and HC have the best 'rendering" of any Nikon 50. However it does have barrel distortion, which the later 50/1.8 does not.

105? which version, the Sonnar or the Gauss? Both are stunningly good, but the Gauss is better close up. I prefer the early Sonnar, but that's just me.

200 f:4/ Mine is superb. and for the $60 I paid here, better than superb. Definitely not "pedestrian".

Another favorite is the 35/2 Nikkor O, mine is from '67.