Nikon DX camera and a FX lens

Here's a rookie question. Will the Nikon AF-S FX NIKKOR 200-500mm f/5.6E ED work with my D7200 DX format? I'm looking for a decent lens of this range and I found this one. Are there any other choices if this is not compatible?

Yes, I have had that combination and it will work very nicely. With some exceptions, Nikon FX lenses will work on DX cameras

Without question it will work. Here is what it can do on my D7100:

Wonderful photo, David. Interesting color.

This proves the moon is blue:-) Beautiful! The exposure /or post appears to be perfect, how did U expose it? My guess is a spot reading in the transition area & then bracket. This last full moon I was shooting the full moon w/ earthbound objects in the foreground & fill flash. I was surprised @ the brightness of the moon. It's difficult to expose for both despite using the spot meter. The moon kept ending up a blinkkie. Also keeping both in focus.

"Wonderful photo, David." - Ditto, Bravo.

Been using FX lenses on DX bodies since Nikon came out with digital cameras. They work fine.

This proves the moon is blue:) Beautiful! The exposure /or post appears to be perfect, how did U expose it? My guess is a spot reading in the transition area & then bracket. This last full moon I was shooting the full moon w/ earthbound objects in the foreground & fill flash. I was surprised @ the brightness of the moon. It's difficult to expose for both despite using the spot meter. The moon kept ending up a blinkkie. Also keeping both in focus.

I’ve never done it, but the moon is in full Sun, so I think the ‘sunny 16’ rule gets you in the ball park.

I’ve never done it, but the moon is in full Sun, so I think the ‘sunny 16’ rule gets you in the ball park.

 

The bright bit of the moon is in full sun, but it is a long way away and the light travels through atmospheres (think akin to a mild ND Filter).

 

The rule of thumb used to for the exposure of the moon is: "The F/11 Rule". Colloquially, "The Loony F/11 Rule"

 

***

 

I am not answering 'how David exposed it', however the EXIF reveals F/8 @ 1/60th @ ISO100, Spot Metering, Manual Mode.

 

Obviously that's the result; HOW David got there, is the important bit.

 

WW

The D7200 not just work with the lens you're asking about, but will also work with almost any Nikon lens made since 1977(there are a few notable exceptions that you won't likely encounter-F3AF lenses won't focus, and IX-Nikkor lenses will damage the mirror).

 

Back in the early days of digital, Nikon didn't even make DX-specific lenses despite not coming out with a full fame digital camera until 2007. Also, for a while many pro lenses would cover the full frame, but at least as I see it they were "DX optimized"-the first generation 70-200 f/2.8 VR is a good example of this. It's super sharp in the center, but falls off pretty quickly toward the corners especially wide open. From what I've seen(I've not personally shot with one) the VRII version of this lens gives better performance over the entire frame than the first version, but loses a tiny bit of sharpness in the center relative to the older lens. The 70-200mm f/2.8E FL, which is the current version, is better than both all over the frame :) .

 

Also of some note-DX lenses can mount on FX and film cameras, although some will vignette badly when doing so, some will give terrible performance at the edge of the frame, and some are more or less perfectly fine at least over part of the zoom range(I use the 10-20mm DX AF-P all the time on my D600 and D800-it's usable past 14mm).

I have an urgent chore this morning, (changing a motor mount in my daughter's car), but I'll post more on my process later. The EXIF data is correct, but the PP is just as important to the result you see here.

The bright bit of the moon is in full sun, but it is a long way away and the light travels through atmospheres (think akin to a mild ND Filter).

 

The rule of thumb used to for the exposure of the moon is: "The F/11 Rule". Colloquially, "The Loony F/11 Rule"

 

WW

I like any rule that's Loony!

 

Surely any Earth based photos we take are with light that has also passed through our atmosphere?

It seems to have been relatively (compared to how long people have been looking) discovered that the moon has some specular reflection, such that full moons are brighter than one would otherwise expect. That should make it a little less than sunny/16.

 

Otherwise, it seems that the moon reflectance is about 12%, so a little less than the 18% used for metering, and sunny/16.

Surely any Earth based photos we take are with light that has also passed through our atmosphere?

Even more true for this particular image, as it was captured from Furnace Creek in Death Valley, about 190 feet below sea level.

 

OK, so I'll 'fess up: The image posted above appears to have been a quick-and-dirty edit of something that was still in process, and now I can't determine exactly where I was in the edit process when I posted it. So, I've re-enacted the process and can share it here with some little surety I'm telling the truth. Here I used a Nikon D7100 + Nikkor 200-500mm/5.6, ISO 100 (lowest native ISO available), f/8, 500mm (750mm equivalent on full frame), 1/60 second exposure, white balance Auto. The camera (as are all my bodies) is equipped with a RRS "L" bracket, and was mounted to a very sturdy Calumet tripod via a RRS clamp. Focus was obtained manually using live view zoomed-in to nearly full magnification. I made a number of exposures using a variety of shutter speeds, but keeping the aperture in the best range for the lens. Previous lunar photography has shown that I need to work with a variety of exposures in order to obtain useful results, as the actual luminosity of the moon varies quite a bit depending on phase and atmospheric conditions. In this case I shot in a range of 1/60s-1/200s. Here is the image as it came out of camera:

 

 

I applied the following edits in LR-5:

1. Crop square and to fill frame

2. Temperature +7

3. Graduated filter to bring down the very bright areas facing the sun

4. Exposure -0.12

5. Contrast +38

6. Shadows +26

7. Whites +19

8. Blacks -17

9. Clarity +19

10. Vibrance +52

11. Saturation +45

12. Sharpening 23, at 85% masking

13. Noise reduction Luminance 23, Color 29

14. Remove chromatic aberration enabled, value = 10

15. Exported as a JPEG

 

Here is today's (better documented) result:

(Please note that both images have been downsized to 1000 pixels max to meet PN posting guidelines.)

 

For anyone interested in lunar photography I strongly recommend extensive experimentation. Images seem to work out best at phases other than full, as there is much more texture evident with the raking light. I also recommend shooting in RAW (though this is from a JPEG source image) as you'll have far more data to work with. In any case, my best lunar images always require both careful exposure in the field and substantial post processing in order to obtain my desired results. Good luck and happy trails...

Edited March 31, 2019 by DavidTriplett

. . . Surely any Earth based photos we take are with light that has also passed through our atmosphere?

 

Yes correct. But it is not about the Sun's light passing through the atmosphere. We are considering the light reflected from the Subject to make our exposure.

 

The point I was making is that the moon (The Subject) is a long way away from the Camera.

 

The "F/16 Rule" (for front lit Subjects in Full Sun) - is for earth placed Subjects and these are all comparatively very close to the Camera.

 

Does that make better sense?

 

WW

Oops... never mind.

I don't think there is DX lenses that are in the 500mm range so the only choice is to use FX lenses.

Yes correct. But it is not about the Sun's light passing through the atmosphere. We are considering the light reflected from the Subject to make our exposure.

 

The point I was making is that the moon (The Subject) is a long way away from the Camera.

 

The "F/16 Rule" (for front lit Subjects in Full Sun) - is for earth placed Subjects and these are all comparatively very close to the Camera.

 

Does that make better sense?

 

WW

Well, kind of. Are we not always taking photos with light reflected from the subject? I understand that the sunny 16 rule is for Earth based subjects, I was just making the point that this should also get you in the ball park for the moon. The Sun is 93 million miles (UK) away from the Earth, and about the same, give or take a quarter of a million miles (depending on when viewed) from the Moon. I would not have thought that the inverse square law would make any significant difference on luminance for a subject 10 feet away or a quarter of a million miles away, lit by something 93 million miles away? In each case, the light has also passed through one atmosphere. So I’m looking at it as two objects lit by a light source the same distance from each, and viewed through one Atmosphere. It is quite possible however, that I am completely missing something fundamental! Thanks for your reply.

viewed through one Atmosphere

As noted above, that "one atmosphere" is a highly variable factor. The actual nature and degree of light absorption by the atmosphere depends upon many factors. These include the angle of the moon above the horizon, altitude of the observer, suspended dust, relative humidity, clouds, heat distortion, etc. In actual practice, I've seen a best exposure (for the moon) vary by several stops, and sometimes more. The image I posted above was made at near maximum moon altitude, but from full thickness of the atmosphere (190 feet below sea level), in clear, dry air. This is very different from a low angle image through far greater atmosphere, or from images I've made from over 10,000 feet above sea level. The thickness and amount of atmosphere we experience in terrestrial images are very sensitive to atmospheric effects, even when dealing with ranges of feet to miles. How much more impacted are images which deal with hundreds to thousands of miles of atmospheric perturbation? Any supposed "rule" will only apply within a small range of potential conditions.

As noted above, that "one atmosphere" is a highly variable factor. . . .

 

Yes. The "F/16 Rule" is usually never quoted in full. It has caveats, the two main ones being that it is applicable between the Tropics and about one and an half hours after sunrise and before sunset.

 

*

 

I'd like stuart to better understand the point about the Subject (The Moon) being so far from the Camera and likening the atmosphere to an ND Filter.

 

I'll draw a diagram later today.

 

WW

. . .I'd like stuart to better understand the point about the Subject (The Moon) being so far from the Camera and likening the atmosphere to an ND Filter. I'll draw a diagram later today. . .

 

 

We have two different Subjects, represented by a red triangle with a black centre. One Subject is on the Earth's surface and the other is the moon.

 

We have two cameras, represented by the red arrows.

 

The yellow lines represent the light from the sun that illuminating the two Subjects: importantly this point is not about the relative intensity of the sun's illumination on the Subjects - let's assume that the sun's illumination on both Subjects is identical.

 

Consider the camera which is photographing the moon. This camera has to 'shoot through' the earth's atmosphere and this atmosphere has an effect of about a 1 Stop ND Filter. Hence, the F/16 Rule for Subjects on Earth illuminated by bright Sun and the F/11 Rule for the bright face of the moon.

 

There is more maths to it than that, but in essence, that's the crux of it: and in any case these 'rules' are guides and were made a long time ago when light meters weren't around and/or were quite expensive.

 

Yes, stuart, the F/16 rule will get you close, there was no argument - just a passion to explain why F/11 gets you a bit closer.

 

WW

There is more maths to it than that, but in essence, that's the crux of it: and in any case these 'rules' are guides and were made a long time ago when light meters weren't around and/or were quite expensive.

 

It worked for Ansel Adams when he couldn't find his light meter and had a once-in-a-lifetime shot, but then I also understand that the resulting negative was quite a bear to print well.

 

I would never advocate for NOT using a meter, but at the same time the Lunar f/11 rule helped create one of the most iconic landscape photographs of the 20th century.

 

We have two different Subjects, represented by a red triangle with a black centre. One Subject is on the Earth's surface and the other is the moon.

 

We have two cameras, represented by the red arrows.

 

The yellow lines represent the light from the sun that illuminating the two Subjects: importantly this point is not about the relative intensity of the sun's illumination on the Subjects - let's assume that the sun's illumination on both Subjects is identical.

 

Consider the camera which is photographing the moon. This camera has to 'shoot through' the earth's atmosphere and this atmosphere has an effect of about a 1 Stop ND Filter. Hence, the F/16 Rule for Subjects on Earth illuminated by bright Sun and the F/11 Rule for the bright face of the moon.

 

There is more maths to it than that, but in essence, that's the crux of it: and in any case these 'rules' are guides and were made a long time ago when light meters weren't around and/or were quite expensive.

 

Yes, stuart, the F/16 rule will get you close, there was no argument - just a passion to explain why F/11 gets you a bit closer.

 

WW

 

 

Thanks very much for taking the time to reply, nice drawing. I fully get what you are saying, and it makes perfect sense. Bear with me here, I am sure the following logic is flawed, but I can’t think why, or where:

 

OK, so the atmosphere acts like a 1 stop ND. We agree that the light intensity from the Sun is the same in each case (the moon is effectively the same distance from the Sun as the Earth is) and it is the distance from the light source that is important here. The Moon is illuminated by light that has not passed through the Earth’s atmosphere, but when we photograph it, that light has to pass through the atmosphere so it can reach our camera. The light outside the atmosphere is however, brighter than within it, (by definition, our nominal 1 stop). That’s why, just after Armstrong finished with ‘Giant Leap’ for Mankind, he turned off his microphone and said ******, it ‘aint half bright up here!’. Any subject we photograph on the surface of the Earth, and inside the atmosphere, is photographed with light that has already passed through the atmosphere, similarly reducing its brightness, compared to when it was outside the atmosphere by 1 stop. So has the light in each case not passed through this ‘1 stop ND filter’ once? In which case it should be the same intensity? OK, the Moon does not reflect all of that light, reducing its intensity, but then so does any subject on the Earth, except Trumps teeth.

 

Yours, confused

The flaw in that argument is here:

 

"Any subject we photograph on the surface of the Earth, and inside the atmosphere, is photographed with light that has already passed through the atmosphere, similarly reducing its brightness, compared to when it was outside the atmosphere by 1 stop."

 

That argument is comparing: light illuminating the Subject (on the Earth's surface) with light reflected from the Subject (the moon).

WW

Hmm. Suppose we have a small model of the moon, with exactly the same reflectance as the real moon. Then we photograph the model on the earth's surface, lit directly by sunlight which has lost one stop of brightness during its passage through the atmosphere. How is that different from photographing the real moon lit by undiminished sunlight, where the light reaching the model on the earths surface has also lost one stop of its brightness through its atmospheric passage? Edited April 2, 2019 by John Seaman