DSC_5974 Sparrow Hawk Laurel Cottage 15-03-2012

DSC_5974 Sparrow Hawk Laurel Cottage 15-03-2012, originally uploaded by rodtuk.

See other photos of the sparrowhawk on my Flickr site.

Taken with Nikon D90 and 18-200mm lens

Using Nikkor lens on Panasonic Lumix GX1

One of the downsides of buying the GX1 is that it a system camera and so I am temped to buy other lenses and flash guns similar to my behaviour with my D90 system.

I have a micro 4/3 to Nikon AI adapter left over from my brief affair with a GF2. I have so far attached Nikkor micro 50 mm f 2.8 (renown for its sharpness) and a Tokina 70-200 f4 ( renown for its ordinariness).

Now I expected these manual focus lens would have to be operated in stop down metering mode. In this mode usually the screen would go dim but the EVF automatically increases it's gain and remains bright. The exposure works in this mode, so if you stop down aperture the shutter speed lengthens as it should. If auto ISO is set then this may also vary.

Another good feature that as the GX1 is in manual focus by pressing the rear control button the centre part of the image is magnified.

I was very pleased with the result but there were several rejects amongst the result.

Why I chose Panasonic Lumix GX1

As discussed in my previous post I had a short list of cameras for my travel and walking consisting of

• Panasonic Lumix G3
• Canon G12
• Fuji X10
• Nikon P7100

Well I finally decided on a G3 kit which I hoped to purchase when visiting Focus-on-Imaging show in NEC. In deed Camera World were selling the standard kit for £400. However they were also selling the GX1 for £600 and including the EVF (view finder) at no extra coat. Now this retails for £200-230 and I had dismissed the GX1 as it would have been twice as much as the G3 although the new power zoom lens was very compct and ideal for travel and a metal body.

The EVF is the Mark 2 with 1.44 Megapixels and very clear.

Masses to learn but so far very pleased. It has the keen amateur as its prime user with such controls as

• Mode Dial
• Exposure +- dial
• Manual focus magnifier
• Customisable quick menu and function buttons
• RAW (incidently Apple just updated Lion to support GX1 Raw