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It's less convenient than a separate light meter, but there's no reason in the world why you couldn't do that. Just a couple of things to mind though:

 

If you're using evaluative (multi-segment) metering, then you need the same framing for both cameras. Make sure that the ISO's match between the cameras or that you know how to adjust for the difference.

The communication between flash and body is indeed limited, but that doesn't mean it's non-existent. The Hexar looks for the flash ready signal on the shoe to go from ambient only to ambient+flash balanced exposure in P-mode.. A modified Hexar additionally takes the button press during startup for guide number into consideration to switch.

 

The Hexar manual is obscure about what happens, but describes it as follows; the Hexar starts with the aperture and shutter speed selected for correct ambient exposure. If the Hexar knows a flash present, it closes down or opens up the aperture only at the very end of the exposure and then strobes the flash given the distance=GN/aperture rule. In effect, this is two complete and separate exposures on top of each other.. At first I was completely stumped, how could this work without blowing out the highlights on my slides, which it never did?

 

After a while I figured out that it doesn't really matter in practical situations. In low light and P-mode, the shutter speed doesn't fall below the camera shake speed, so the flash makes the exposure. In bright situations, especially backlit portraits, flash works as fill only. Flash output is restricted by the distance=GN/aperture rule, and nicely fills in shadows at the focused distance, while it's power drops by a square of the distance and doesn't register in the background.. My conclusion: don't compensate EV/ISO, except when shooting frame filling grey cards in medium light ;)

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That should read 25cm close focus of course..

I've got that same lens, and it's not bad at all. There's no comparable zoom in the Nikon line for the same money, what with its metal bayonet, decent build, aspherical optics, distance scale, 0.25cm close focus, and sunshade.

 

You can get these new at ridiculously low prices, and second hand for next to nothing at all. I'd say: replace with same, as it seems beyond salvation..

 

But keep the ruined lens and take it apart or take some of the glass elements out and experiment. Build a lensbaby that retains light metering ability.. Stick on a door-peephole and get a fish-eye view..

Many thanks to all of you! And especially to Darren for explaining the green channel aspect of the histogram. I guess I'll stick to the blinkies then and bracket when they get too bad..

I went for a stroll in a forest this weekend, and due to the lighting had

problems galore getting proper exposure. The strong sun and some fog combined

to get a blinking highlight warning in most every shot. The histograms

confirmed that a lot of the exposure was bunched up at the right hand side.

 

So, whenever I ran into the situation, I dialed in about 2/3 stops of

compensation which made the highlight warnings a lot less severe. But when I

uploaded the (jpeg fine 800iso) pictures, I found that the original shots that

gave warnings weren't really blown out. Instead, those where I dialed in

compensation looked decidedly muddy and featureless..

 

This begs the question wether the blinking highlight warning is really useful

for pinpointing the exposure? Anyone else use it, or are you going by the

histograms? And if so, how (much) do you compensate?<div></div>

The shutter speed is timed electronically. Although tripped mechanically, the lens mounted shutter stays open due to an electric currrent through one of the contacts. Once the body cuts off the current, the shutter closes.

 

That 2 lenses on two bodies have the same timing error may seem quite remarkable at first glance. The thing is, that even when new, the lenses won't go much faster than about 1/350ish in reality.

 

For speeds between 1/60 and 1/250 though, everything should work correctlt. Did you try the other body/lens combination?

I agree, a 24-50 equivalent would be just great. But what I see happening, is that Nikon is focussing on increasing the tele-end of the 18-xx zooms. 18-55, 18-70, 18-135, 18-200. The logic behind this completely escapes me..

I've had an F80 act up more than once as well. The problems proved to be twofold. First, I found gunk on the battery contacts, which caused early rewinds as the motor couldn't draw enough power. The other problem was intermittent problems taking pictures. In the end it proved to be dirty contacts inside the film chamber for the DX coding, which it needs to calculate exposure.

Not only is Polaroid difficult to come by, it's expensive too. I've got to fork out what works out to be about EUR 3.00 per shot to use them, and that's the cheapest 125ISO colour proofing stuff which doesn't even give negatives. After a measly fifteen packs, you've already paid for a DSLR.

 

Then there's the problem that an MF camera plus pola back only gives a 56x56mm frame on the print. Given the instant process, this 55x55mm is not at all that impressive in the quality department. You may get decent scans with a polaroid camera that fills the entire frame, but certainly not with that 6x6 cutout.

 

Another caveat with polaroid is its reciprocity characteristic. It doesn't like long exposures, multiple exposures or multiple open flash. Where most colour print film handles 1 second exposures very well without exposure adjustment, the polaroids which I used conked out at 1/10th or so.. though the B&W polapan 400 is decidedly better than the polacolour 125 in this regard. With flash, every next pop needs double the power or so it seems..

 

Of course, there's still potential in the creative department for polaroid backs if you're after a certain look and don't mind the grain..<div></div>

If the lens mount doesn't change, I think it's safe to assume that FF tele lenses will work on a FF digital body, but with wide angle lenses I'm not so sure. They may be used, but wether they'll perform as outstanding as on film bodies remains to be seen. Especially the light fall-off at the edges may be so severe that you have to resort to all kinds of post processing gymnastics to get an evenly illuminated field. This won't really help in the image quality department..

Do you really need 7fps or more? Yanking film through a camera may sound impressive, but is hardly a substitute for timing your shots correctly.

 

If what you want is to make motion sequences, get a digital camcorder with DV output instead. Then select the frames you need and stitch them into a sequence again..

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I've got the 28-70/3.5-4.5 (albeit the AF-D version), and have not seen that behaviour on my D50 and F75. Focusses correctly on both.

I've got a D50, and no matter how careful I am when changing lenses, specks land on the sensor every time I swap lenses. This is amazing, as the mirror sits in front of the shutter which again sits in front of the sensor, and I have the camera switched off. Go figure..

 

I must say that it's worse when I'm changing lenses immediately after taking pictures, and it's better when the camera has been switched off for a day or so. This means that unless I plan on taking a sensor swab with me in the field, changing lenses is a haphazard undertaking.

 

The D50 is an excellent camera, but this 'dust magnet feature' has me eying other brands with dust removal built-in.

None of the lens combinations will allow you to do all the things you listed.. portrets, sport, street, architecture and nature. Although some are better for some of the things than others..

 

Despite the VR, the zooms that you mention will not allow shutter speeds that freeze motion in sports because of their 5.6 aperture. Daniels suggestion to get a second hand 80-200/2.8 isn't bad advice for sports and nature at all. Get the 50/1.8 as well for portraits. It's cheap, can throw the backgrounds out of focus and works in the lowest of lights. For the wide end, look for a lens that has a lower zoom ratio than the ones mentioned. Lenses with 5x or more zoom ratio are problematic for architecture because of the barrel distortion and lack of sharpness at the wide end. You may want to look for an 18-35 instead..

The Bronica leaf shutters allow flash synchronisation at every shutter speed. You can use the apertures from the table on the flash, and select the corresponding shutter speed to get you a proper exposure for ambient light, thereby balancing flash and what's available..

The least material aspect of buying a macro lens is the image quality. That will be equally outstanding across these models, and the relevance of any difference will pale in comparisson to your technique. More important is how these lenses handle, and that depends on you. Check them out in the flesh on the camera that you use. How do they balance when focused close, where does the weight go when they extend? Which way does the focus ring turn, same as your other lenses or the other way round? Do you like the grip, is it large enough? These factors decide wether you'll feel comfortable in using it. And when you're working at ground level or in tight quarters, that's the difference between getting the picture or not..

I've had a 1x1.5 meter enlargement of a 6MP dSLR picture printed, and no one ever comments on any lack of detail. Although truth be told, it wasn't a still life, just something extraordinarily funny. But trust me, it's been seen by pixelpeepers. It can only get better when you move to 10MP, although I doubt wether it's a giant leap. There are only 30% more pixels on each side..

 

But in my experience, the amount of enlargement possible isn't the main reason to go with 6x6, and neither is sheer resolution. Instead it's the difference in tonality and the way depth of field works when you have to enlarge so much less than with a small format system. The difference can be seen in prints of any size.

 

As for shooting floral bouquets, I'd say that unless you want to isolate individual flowers or really need to go 1:1, you don't need a macro lens. An 80mm will do splendidly for bouquets, and if you want something more than the typical 1:10 magnification, an extension tube will get you there..

I used to have one, and the optics were indeed surprisingly good. Plenty resolution and sharpness, very low levels of abberations. Goes to 1:2, and comes with a matched close up adapter that gets you to 1:1. Mechanical construction is not its strongest point to say the least; AF speed on my Nikon was lethargic while it made the screeching sound of a chalk on a blackboard. Of course, when used as a macro lens, you'll be on manual focus all the time, so this shouldn't really be held against it. Great way to get you started in macro photography..

The D50 gives good enough prints straight out of the camera that you don't need extra sharpening or saturation. Overdoing on sharpening and saturation exagerates the differences between neighbouring pixels, and depending on your ISO setting can give horrid results. I've found that for colour prints without using additional noise reduction software, ISO 200-400 is best to avoid mottling.

 

What I've also noticed, is that as far as sharpness is concerned, using good technique is key. I get razor sharp images when the D50 sits on a tripod, but that critical sharpness often isn't there when I handhold.