Darin McQuoid Photography

Nikon to Sony NEX E Mount Tilt Adapter

There is no getting around it, traditional tilt/shift lenses are expensive, with the cheapest Arsat model coming in around $600 and Nikon's T/S lenses at $2,200 each. Because the image circle of Nikon Pre-AI, AI, and AI-S lenses is large enough to cover 35mm film, they can be used as a tilt lens via an adapter to the Sony NEX E Mount or Micro 4/3 cameras. If you put "Nikon to NEX tilt adapter" into the ebay search box plenty of results come up.

I bought one of the $50 variety. Rotating a ring on the adapter sets the degree of tilt, while the whole thing rotates 360 degrees allowing the tilt to be set to any angle. Unfortunately the rotating ring doesn't have enough tension and is too easy to change, while the adjustment for tilt is hard to keep at the exact degree you want. The degree marking is just a sticker that comes off only too soon. To add to the downsides, it does not allow any lens with a hard focus infinity stop to focus to infinity. It is also not usable with G lenses. That creates quite the conundrum as most Pre-AI/AI/AI-S lenses have a hard focus infinity stop. No free lunch here. It's a tilt adapter and it does tilt, but with poor construction and handling. Since it can't focus to infinity it's not the end all be all Nikon AI to NEX adapter.

Diane Gaydos, South Fork Yuba

Sony NEX-5n, Nikon 75-150 Series E + Tilt Adapter