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Nikon scope Camera adapter for SLR (1 Viewer)

Jad

Not sure this will help you much but here are my experience so far. I recently purchased the SLR adapter for my 82ed and a nikon N-80 / f-80, d100, d70 will not read/meter light through the scope, you either need a seperate light meter, or what I tried is spot metering subject area with lense on camera with apeture set at 13.3 to get a idea of proper shutter speed/ expusure. Most all of my first shots came out underexposed (alot of times I was half guessing at expursure) so next time I will bracket at even slower shutter speeds. Some of my first shots are good but far from great, a little promising and I will try agian soon, and bracket with slower shutter speeds and hopefully get some nicer pictures.

The f-100, f5, d1x, will all meter light through the scope.

Jad
 
Well, co-incidence. I have a Nikon D100 and have only just found out about digiscoping and dying to know what i have to get to be able to have the advantage of field scope magnification. Do you buy the scope first and then look for an adapter, or what do you do. i want the best stuff I can afford. Neat , by the way, using the camera to meter for you ! Great idea. What products should I be considering, may i ask. there seems to be a wide range of scopes available but the prices vary wildy . Thanks, John
 
Hi John,
I think we need to clarify a few things. With a dslr connected to a scope, you will not be digiscoping as such and nor will you get the magnification that traditional digiscoping allows. You are basically using the scope as a manual focus prime lens (often 800-1000mm @ f10+ or so), with this method (which was used for many years with 35mm slr) you replace the scope's eyepiece with an slr adapter made by the scope manufacturer, this terminates in a T2 mount for the approriate camera lens mount.

There are problems with this arrangement, notably lack of metering (as mentioned above) and the small aperture that makes things very dim in the viewfinder, as well as the obvious lack of light in the image in general (high iso needed).
Traditional digiscoping involves using a compact digital camera (invariably the Nikon coolpix range 990/995/4500) attached to the actual eyepiece of the scope, therefore getting the huge magnification from these (20-60x) together with the cameras own internal 3 or 4x zoom (handy for composition as well). Surprisingly, the f# of this set-up is often less than f6 @ a total focal length of 2,000mm (though it's dependant on the objective lens size of the scope, 80mm+ being the best).

As far as scopes, you get what you pay for in terms of optical quality....think Zeiss, Leica, Swarovski, Kowa or Nikon if you're into larger prints.

Some guys are starting to use dslr's in a similar manner, using appropriate lenses and then held up to the scope's eyepiece.

Regards,
Andy


johncoxon said:
Well, co-incidence. I have a Nikon D100 and have only just found out about digiscoping and dying to know what i have to get to be able to have the advantage of field scope magnification. Do you buy the scope first and then look for an adapter, or what do you do. i want the best stuff I can afford. Neat , by the way, using the camera to meter for you ! Great idea. What products should I be considering, may i ask. there seems to be a wide range of scopes available but the prices vary wildy . Thanks, John
 
Jad


I've tried using a camera adapter on my Kowa 'scope with a 35mm Nikon SLR. I find the setup rather user unfriendly. Has as been mentioned, most of the camera auto functions will not work, so basic light metering and manual focus. Also the weight of the camera plus adapter makes the scope tail heavy and unstable. It takes me a lot of film to get few good images.

AndyC
 
I use a Nikon adapter on a 60mm ED scope with an old manual Nikon EM. I get some decent results but only in good light conditions because of the lack of control over exposure etc. Have a look for photos under my name in the gallery for examples.
 
Andrew
I can't find a gallery for examples?, I did search fifebirder and Andrew in the 3 gallery sections and came up with no matches, not sure what I'm doing wrong.

Thanks
 
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