Equipment Journal: Nikon AI Nikkor 50mm f2

A couple of years ago, I found myself wanting another 50mm lens for my Nikon system. We have an AF-S 50mm f1.8G but it lives in Amanda’s camera bag. While she always lets me use any of her lenses (a fact that I make frequent use of when I need her Tamron 90mm macro…love that lens!), I wanted something small that I could just keep in my bag. I thought about something like a Series E or AF-D 50mm f1.8 but I tried one of the latter years ago and just didn’t like the rendering from it. It always came off as kind of harsh to me. Many years ago, Mike Johnston wrote an article called The 50mm Lens and Metaphysical Doubt. He had a similar take on the various f1.8 Nikon 50mms and mentioned an older Nikkor — the 50mm f2.

The 50mm f2 actually goes all the way to the beginning of Nikon’s F mount. It was one of the lenses that debuted with the original Nikon F in 1959. The first lens had seven elements. In 1964, it was revised to a six element design. It was upgraded to an AI series lens (which changed the mechanics of the lens but the optics remained the same as the 1964 version) when they came out in 1977. The AI Nikkor 50mm f2 remained in production until 1979. It is this version that I own.

Initially, I didn’t use the lens an awful lot. It mostly served as a body cap for my F4S. While I used it occasionally with that camera, it didn’t see a lot of use on my digital Nikons. Sometime last year I decided to take it out for a spin and see what it could do, though. One of my first outings with it on a digital body was a trip to the San Juan Bautista cemetery in Florence, Colorado. I took this shot at sunset on May 5th, 2019.

I also used it for a blue hour shot using some off camera flash at the same cemetery later that evening.

I used it for this scene of accumulated “stuff” decorating the side of one of the buildings at La Resolana farm in Pueblo, Colorado later that month. The lens is pleasantly sharp. It doesn’t smack you in the face with its sharpness like some of the newest lens designs but I could easily make an 24″x30″ print of this that would have all the detail one could ever want.

The lens captured the wonderful range of colors and tones in this shot of a windmill on Colorado’s eastern plains on a stormy Memorial Day weekend last year.

The lens came with on a photo walk with the Chicago Streets and Beyond Photo Group in Naperville on December 29th, 2019. While not a macro lens, it does focus close enough for walk around purposes. I loved the texture of these old bricks on a driveway near the Naperville train station.

It was one of the lenses that came along on my trip to Graceland Cemetery recently. Here’s a repost of the shot of the Louis Sullivan designed Getty Tomb.

The lens has one minor fault. It has an iris with six straight aperture blades. That does create hexagonal shapes in the bokeh occasionally. You can see it in the specular shapes between the tree branches in this shot taken at Ernie Banks’ monument at Graceland. This doesn’t show up too often, though.

Here’s a shot from that outing that I didn’t post last time. The lens has a very flat field and works well for this kind of shot that exists mostly in one plane. Don’t try this with a Sonnar. 😉

You might remember this shot from my first quarantine walk:

Here’s a full resolution crop (click on the photo for full size of the crop) of that shot to show what the lens is capable of. It won’t win awards for sharpness, microcontrast, bokeh, or any of the other myriad of measures that photographers go nuts about. But I really just like how it renders a scene as a whole. It has pleasing method of “painting” that doesn’t draw attention to itself. The picture is more about the picture, not what the lens is doing with it.

And finally, a shot from last weekend’s wanderings. This shot of the Mazon, IL grain elevator again shows a nice rendition of color and tone that I really appreciate.

Suffice it to say that I’ve really come to appreciate what this little lens can do. It’s my go-to lens when I want to just take a walk with one of my Nikons. It balances well with my Nikon FA (equipment journal coming up soon in the next month or so). It can keep up with the resolution demands of the D800 but in a way that doesn’t seem harsh. It’s a lens that I find myself using more and more. And when one owns as many lenses as I do, it’s saying something when a particular lens gets a lot of use. Highly recommended.