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I've always been a cheapskate, buying most of my film gear used.

Only with digital have I had to buy new.

Recently I started looking at how cheap used film gear has become after I had such fun shooting 35mm film again when a fan in Sedona sent me his Nikonos IV-A as a gift, since he couldn't give it away. My pal Tedd in Florida just bagged an F100 at a garage sale for $100, and if he didn't buy it, it was probably going in the dumpster that evening. Another reader just handed me his Nikon N2020 because he couldn't get rid of it.

Crap; I paid full price, about $1,400 after sales tax, for my F100 in 1999 and it's one of the projects about which I wrote starting the tech section of this website.

My pal Bill asked me to list some of his used gear on our photo club website, and after a few days of it not moving, I realized I had to buy it just because it was so cheap. I got a 28mm f/3.5 AI for $35, a 43-86mm AI for $35 and an exotic 20mm f/3.5 AI for $50, all in just about unused condition. I paid $400 for the same 20mm lens in worse condition used 10 years ago!

Poking around the used section at Adorama you can get your choice of Nikon F3 or F4s for a couple of hundred dollars, or an F5 for not much more. I ordered some for my own fun and testing.

I got my 50mm f/1.4 AI as a donation for when I wrote my 50mm lens comparison in 2006.

These folks realize, as I have myself, that they're never going to use this older stuff, especially manual focus, again, so they have wanted to get it to a good cause and/or not bother with selling and shipping things so inexpensive online.

I'm not going to use it much either, and sold much of my manual focus stuff a few years ago, too, but today I realize I ought to review and archive it before it all goes away. I remember 10 years ago when a pal at A&M Records in Hollywood brought home an 8-track 1" recorder when he saw it sitting by the dumpster. Herb Alpert had recorded on it, but since it no longer served any commercial purpose, it was chucked.

Print shops have long tossed their stat cameras, light tables and carbon-arc platemakers, since everything has been digital for a decade or more. Once these items, like old camera gear, are passed on by history, the prices drop, and with the bigger stuff, you have to pay people to haul it away.

The Ranch

Here's my idea: before sending your old gear, especially Nikon lenses, to the dumpster or eBaying it for less than the shipping cost, why not send it to me so I can review and immortalize it here for everyone's benefit? Not only did I review the 50mm f/1.4 I was given, but it stays here so I can use it in evaluating other things as they come in. I don't photograph with it, but I certainly use it as a prop when photographing camera bodies and to see what plugs and plays with what as new cameras come out.

Even in the first few weeks of my crazy idea, these donations have allowed me to add illustrations to my Nikon Lens History and Technology page, create my Nikon System Compatibility page and write my Mother of All Nikon Lens Compatibility Charts.

My current genius plan is to compare all of these, by focal length, against each other on the Nikon D3 and present the results. This should settle once and for all which lenses are the best: zoom or fixed, auto or manual focus, new or old, etc. If I can complete this project before I die, it will be monumental. To do this I've also been buying up samples of older lenses on my own, including the ones I used to own but sold years ago.

Let me know what you've got, what, if anything you want for it (I'll pay shipping if you'd like, even if the gear is a gift), and how you'd like me to credit you in my eventual review.

Please ask before shipping me a box full, since I may already have the common items. Rare items of course are needed; I have always wanted to borrow a Nikon 6mm 220 degree fisheye lens.

If you want to sell your gear for a fair price or know another great cause, like a student, school or photographer who will use this gear, then forget about me and give it to them. No, I'm not a tax deduction.

If it's sitting idle and you'd like to help out others like ourselves who are curious about it, let me know what you've got, and I thank you! My apologies if I'm slow on email; I'm always very backed up and do want to hear from you.

I'm especially looking for a Leica Minilux to compare agains the Konica Hexar and Nikon 35Ti already here, and a clean Nikon FE. The old cheap Nikon FG and FG20 and once very popular 8008 aren't here yet, either. I've also been buying this old stuff myself, care of your contributions, so that I can have a full library of gear to test compatibility and greatly expand my older reviews from the 1990s.

This is a working ranch, not a place where the old go to die. The gear gets out and exercises every time I need to run some experiment to illustrate an article.

Your donations are helping everyone. THANK YOU!!!!!

Ken

Received so far:

I plan to review all of these in depth, but it takes time. I'm waiting for my D3 so I can test the lenses in ridiculous detail on full-frame without having to go to the lab every day and go blind staring at film through a microscope as I used to do.

Lenses

Nikkor 18mm f/3.5 AI-s I bought one to review on the D3

Nikkor 20mm f/3.5 AI-s from Bill in San Diego (review not updated yet)

World's Ugliest 24mm f/2.8 AId from Mike Provost of Barneke and Anderson in Boston. This is great, because not only has it been used as a hockey puck (you can see the vice grip marks on the filter ring from having to bend it back out so many times), the glass is covered with just as much wear. Guess what? It works pretty well. Things are going to get really ugly around here when I face it off against the new Nikon 12-24mm and 24-70mm lenses at 24mm. I'm betting the results will be pretty close. We'll see.

The World's Ugliest 24mm Lens.

AF Nikkor 24mm f/2.8 D from Dick in Rancho Mirage.

Nikkor 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6D AF "Streetsweeper."

Nikkor 28mm f/3.5 AI from Bill in San Diego

Nikon 28mm f/2.8 Series E from Ken Van Vleck in Palo Alto.

Nikkor 28-80mm G from David in Biloxi.

Nikkor AF 28-105mm from Dick in Rancho Mirage. (waiting for D3 for re-review)

Nikkor-S 35mm f/2.8 (factory AI converted), from Will Fastie

Nikkor AF 35-80mm f/4-5.6D from Michelle of Starlight Starbright

Nikkor 35-105mm AF (not working well, ought to be replaced. From local classifieds)

Nikkor 43-86mm f/3.5 AI from Bill in San Diego

Nikon 50mm f/1.2 AI-s, bought brand-spanking-new. (Nikon still makes these!)

Nikkor-H 50mm f/2 (bought from the local classifieds, cheap)

Nikon 50 f/1.8 E from Will Fastie, along with a Soligor 200mm T-mount and a crazy Nikon cable release and pistol grip. I also just got another, older style 50mm f/1.8E from Ken Van Vleck in Palo Alto.

Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 AI from Mike Provost of Barneke and Anderson in Boston.

Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 AI from Bruce in Texas (needs work).

Nikkor 80-200mm f/4.5 AI from Roland Vink

Nikkor 80-200mm f/4 AI-s from Bill in San Diego

Nikkor 100-300mm f/5.6 AI-s from James going to school in Florida.

Nikkor-Q 200mm f/4, AI'd from Guy Prince in California

Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 ED-IF AI from the local classifieds.

Spiratone 400mm f/6.3 from Jim

And I should soon be getting access to:

13mm f/5.6 AI-s: Nikon's Holy Grail

15mm f/3.5 AI-s

16mm f/3.5 AI'd Fisheye (1974)

18mm f/4 AI

18-35mm AF-D

20mm f/3.5 UD AI'd

24mm f/2 AI-s

24mm f/2.8 AI-s

24-50mm AF-D

24-120mm VR

28mm f/2 AI-s

28-45mm AI

28-200mm AF-D (China)

28-200 G (Thailand)

35mm f/2 AI-s

35mm f/2 AF-D

35mm f/2.8 AI-s

35-70mm f/2.8 AF-D

35-70mm f/3.3-4.5 AI-s (Cosina/FE10 kit)

35-70mm f/3.3-4.5 AI-s

35-70mm f/3.5 AI

35-70mm f/3.5 AI-s

35-70mm f/3.3-4.5 AF-N

35-105mm AI-s

35-105mm AF-D (Thank you Lee in Washington state!)

35-135mm AI-s

35-135mm AF

35-200mm AI-s

43-86mm f/3.5 F (The old crappy one that was so bad it gave all zooms the bad rep they retain to this day!)

50mm f/1.8 AF-D (China)

50mm f/1.4 AF-D (China)

50-135mm AI-s

70-180mm AF-D Micro

70-210mm f/4-5.6 AF

75-150mm E

75-300mm AF

80-200mm f/2.8 AI-s: The Hulk.

85mm f/1.4 AF-D

105mm f/2.5 AI-s

105mm f/1.8 AI-s

135mm f/2 AI-s

135mm f/2 AF-D DC

135mm f/2.8 AI-s

135mm f/3.5 F

135mm f/3.5 AI

180mm f/2.8 AI

180mm f/2.8 ED AI-s

180mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF

180mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-n

180mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-D

200mm f/4 AI-s Micro: Precision Incarnate.

300mm f/4.5 ED-IF AI-s

300mm f/4 ED-IF AF

400mm f/3.5 ED-IF AI

TC-14

FE10

FA

FE

FG

N75

N70

SLR Bodies

Nikon F (I bought one from the local classifieds, cheap)

Nikon F3 (review in process, I bought it from Adorama, cheap)

Nikon EM and MD-E from Ken Van Vleck in Palo Alto.

Nikon F4s (review in process, I bought it from Adorama, cheap)

Nikon N2020 (F-501) from Michael in San Diego.

Nikon N4004s (F-401s) from Stu in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

Nikon N5005 (F401x) Bought for $25 from somebody on eBay

Nikon N6006 (F-601) from Michelle of Starlight Starbright

Nikon N8008 (F-801) from Stan from Kendal, Cumbria, U.K.

N8008s (F-801s) From Steve

Nikon FE2 and MD-12 from Robert in Scottsdale.

Nikon F100 from Dick in Rancho Mirage.

Nikon N55 from David in Biloxi.

Nikon F6 (review in process, I bought it from Adorama, cheap)

Nikon MD-11 Motor Drive for FE; from Jeff from Maryland (it may be broken)

Nikon TC-16A (bought myself for $50; it converts manual lenses to AF!)

Nikonos IV-A from Daniel in Sedona

Flashes

Nikon SB-20 Nikon's first AF flash; I bought one cheap.

Professional Point-and-Shoots

Konica Hexar Silver from Jim Greenberg in Pittsburgh

Nikon 35Ti which I bought myself to compare to the Hexar. I don't know about you, but all through the 1990s I always wondered which was the king of pro point and shoots. Today you can get any of these wonders for the same price as a throw-away digital. I ought to get the Leica Minilux and Contax (was it the TVs or ZT3 or?) runners in this category to be fair. Do the Minilux really all die with E02 errors?

Real Cameras (Thanks Jerry and Linda!)

Korona 8x10," c. 1912, with two halves of a B&L 13-3/4" Protar. Sensor size: 195 x 245mm (315mm diagonal)

Anba Wood View 4x5," (Ikeda, Tokyo) with a CP Goerz Berlin 135mm f/5.5 Dagor