# Is AiS the same as AF-S..? saw a Nikkor 50mm 1.4



## giorgio (Jan 15, 2010)

Hi

I'm checking the Nikkor 50mm f/1.4
There some used Nikkor lenses that just say:

Nikon 50 1.4 Ais Lens
or
Nikon 50 1.4 Ai Lens

I mean... what the..., which of the 1.4D AF and 1.4G AF-S is it?
Does "Ais" means that is the  1.4G AF-S ?
Does "Ai" means also the 1.4G AF-S ?

I searched what AiS means but I haven't yet found it, I'll keep looking

I'm guessing that if is a Nikkor50mm 1.4 it only can be one of these two right?:
1.4D AF  or   1.4G AF-S

I have never bought used lenses before.

A used 50mm 1.4 Ais (suposedly excelent condition) for 150.00usd is good right? if it happens to be the AF-S I supose.


Any opinion?

thank you

http://www.adorama.com/US    354784.html


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## Derrel (Jan 15, 2010)

Ai is a manual focusing Nikkor lens, made from around 1977 to 1983 or so, depending on each specific lens model. The "Ai" lens was an Automatic maximum aperture Indexing lens for the first generation of Nikon bodies that used the "Ai" system, like the Nikon F2-A, Nikon EL-2, Nikon FE,etc.

After the Ai series came the Ai-S series, which had a "Speed" notch milled into the rear mount. The "S" feature was first used for the Nikon FA's programmed automatic mode which shifted the shutter speeds higher on longer focal length lenses. This "speed notch" is a milled semi-circular depression on the rear of the lens at the 9 o'clock position, just below one of the mounting lugs. Ai-S lenses have been made from the early 1980's until 2010.

An AF-D is an Autofocus, D-chipped lens. AF was the first AF system beginning in the mid-1980's. The D-chip technology was added in the early 1990's. There were 50mm 1.8 AF, then 1.8 AF-D lenses made for many years. This is the lowest-cost of the modern 50mm autofocus lenses. AF and AF-D lenses will NOT autofocus on the D40,D40x,D60,D3000, or D5000.

There have been 50mm f/1.4 AF and then AF-D lenses made from the mid 1980's until 2009. The 50mm 1.4 AF-D is still available brand new.

AF-S is Autofocusing Silent-Wave motor--the very newest Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 is an AF-S lens with a G-series design--meaning no aperture ring.


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## giorgio (Jan 15, 2010)

(Derrel thanks.., I typed this post before seeing yours, I'll read it then)
Oh!, hmm.., according to my search...
"AiS" is old manual technology??

So there are AI, AIS, AF and AF-S... ?

wow..., have to make sure not to make a mistake.


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## giorgio (Jan 15, 2010)

Derrel said:


> Ai is a manual focusing Nikkor lens, made from around 1977 to 1983 or so, depending on each specific lens model. The "Ai" lens was an Automatic maximum aperture Indexing lens for the first generation of Nikon bodies that used the "Ai" system, like the Nikon F2-A, Nikon EL-2, Nikon FE,etc.
> 
> After the Ai series came the Ai-S series, which had a "Speed" notch milled into the rear mount. The "S" feature was first used for the Nikon FA's programmed automatic mode which shifted the shutter speeds higher on longer focal length lenses. This "speed notch" is a milled semi-circular depression on the rear of the lens at the 9 o'clock position, just below one of the mounting lugs. Ai-S lenses have been made from the early 1980's until 2010.
> 
> ...



Thank you very much for the info, very useful specially when I'm about to slip the card, need to choose wisely.

At first was thinking of a 50 1.8 AF, then the 50 1.4, and now I'm checking if I found some good deal for the 50 1.4 AF-S, which I hope it offers better Image quality besides the practicity of Silent Autofocus and Speed..., which I'm about to investigate its features over the DAF.


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## molested_cow (Jan 15, 2010)

If you have D80, I don't think your camera will recognize AiS lens... at least I know that the D90 doesn't.


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## MrLogic (Jan 15, 2010)

molested_cow said:


> If you have D80, I don't think your camera will recognize AiS lens... at least I know that the D90 doesn't.



Correct. When in doubt, be sure to check a Nikon lens compatibility chart: Nikon Lens Compatibility


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## giorgio (Jan 15, 2010)

molested_cow said:


> If you have D80, I don't think your camera will recognize AiS lens... at least I know that the D90 doesn't.




thank you, but just found out what AiS means..., no worries, it has been discarded.

:thumbup:


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## giorgio (Jan 15, 2010)

Interesting tests I found [URL="http://home.comcast.net/%7Emhmyers/1.4dg.html"]here about the 50mm's  1.4D vs 1.4G on a D80(like mine)[/URL]

BTW..., some webstores point some links to "reviews" of these lenses...
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D AF
Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G AF-S
Sigma 50mm f/1.4

But, these don't seem like reviews.., they just explain what the product seems to offer..., unless ofcourse those are the types of reviews they do, which is ok and valid..., like... "...according to Nikon, this improves correction of off-axis aberrations, which promises better performance towards the edges of the frame particularly when using large apertures."   ...ok.


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## KmH (Jan 15, 2010)

giorgio said:


> So there are AI, AIS, AF and AF-S... ?


Don't leave out AF-I


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## MrLogic (Jan 15, 2010)

giorgio said:


> BTW..., some webstores point some links to "reviews" of these lenses...
> Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D AF
> Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G AF-S
> Sigma 50mm f/1.4
> ...



Try SLRgear.com:

Nikon Lens: Primes - Nikon 50mm f/1.4D AF Nikkor (Tested) - SLRgear.com!
Nikon Lens: Primes - Nikon 50mm f/1.4G AF-S Nikkor (Tested) - SLRgear.com!
Sigma Lens: Primes - Sigma 50mm f/1.4 EX DG HSM (Tested) - SLRgear.com!


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## djacobox372 (Jan 15, 2010)

AIS lenses will work on your d90, and take as good of photos as far more expensive AF-S lenses.  You'll just be limited to manual metering and manual focusing.

This actually isn't that big of deal for "special purpose" lenses like macro, but for a 50mm prime, you'll want autofocus.

If you ever become interested in macro lenses you may reconsider your avoidance of AIS, macro photography is often best done fully manually anyway; and you can buy a 105mm ais f2.8 lens for 1/3rd the price of the same quality AF lens.


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## potownrob (Jan 15, 2010)

Can the sub-D200 Nikon bodies do stop-down metering like the Canons can do? With the Canons (at least the mid-level models like 10D+) I think you can use aperture priority mode with non-Canon lenses even though they can't communicate with the body, and the body meters off of the lens at whatever aperture it's set to (can't use G type lenses that don't have the aperture ring).


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## Garbz (Jan 16, 2010)

One subtle distinction to bring up which is really just splitting hairs, but it is an AF D lens not an AF-D. The distinction is that chipping technology is completely separate from Autofocus technology and thus you can have AF-S D lenses. Just as you can also in theory have AF G lenses (though I'm not sure any of these exist). 

Other than that everything is as Derrel said with the addition of AF-I are lenses with autofocus motors inside them eliminating the mechanical connection to the body (just like AF-S) but the key difference being that the motor is not a piezo electric silent wave motor. So:

AI : Auto Indexing
AI-S : Auto Indexing speed (for want of a better name)
AF : Auto focus (mechanical coupling to body)
AF-I : Auto focus (Internal lens motor)
AF-S : Auto focus (Internal lens silent wave motor, and crappy reuse of "s" character in name)

Additionally:
D : Lenses with CPUs for electronic control where the camera supports it. Aperture ring retained for backwards compatibility but must always be locked at minimum aperture on camera bodies which interface with the CPU.
G : Lenses with CPUs for electronic control. Not backwards compatible to cameras which don't talk digitally to the lens. No Aperture ring :thumbdown:


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## Dwig (Jan 16, 2010)

Garbz said:


> ...
> AI : Auto Indexing
> AI-S : Auto Indexing speed (for want of a better name)
> AF : Auto focus (mechanical coupling to body)
> ...



a bit confused as it mixes focus function/coupling with meter coupling; two rather different issues.

Original pre-AI: mechanical meter coupling via the prong/shoe with either manual or semi-automatic ("Nikon Shuffle") indexing of the maximum aperture. No AF coupling; MF only.

AI: Mechanical Automatic Indexing of aperture to meter. No AF coupling; MF only

AI-s: AI meter coupling with standardized diaphram action making mechanical Program and Shutter priority operation more precise. No AF coupling; MF only

AF: AI-s meter coupling plus electronic meter coupling. mechanical AF coupling requiring motor in body

AF-D: AF plus additional focusing distance data. Mechanical AF coupling like AF.

AF-i: All metering characteristics equivalent of AF lenses. Electronic AF coupling using motor in lens.

AF-s: All metering characteristics equivalent of AF-D lenses except those AF-s lenses that are also "G" lenses, see below. Electronic AF coupling using fast "silent wave" motor in lens.

G: these AF lenses lack a mechanical f/stop ring and all mechanical meter coupling. They have only electronic meter coupling which is equivalent of that of the AF-D lenses. The "G" designation is independent of the AF coupling, though being a new characteristic all so far have been AF-s.

DX: specifies lenses that cover only the smaller DX format. The designation is independent of meter coupling and AF coupling.


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## Derrel (Jan 16, 2010)

Dwig did a pretty good job of wading through 50 years' worth of Nikkor lens nomenclature!!! I agree with every single bit of it,except for one,small correction on category G:

G: these AF lenses lack a mechanical f/stop ring and all mechanical meter coupling. They have only electronic meter coupling which is equivalent of that of the AF-D lenses. The "G" designation is independent of the AF coupling, though being a new characteristic all so far have been AF-s.

Actually, the ORIGINAL G-series lenses were not AF-S focusing, but mechanically screw-driven models. The 70-300 G series consumer zoom lens was in the first wave,and was screw-drive focusing, as was the later 28-200 G-series lens. I have both of those,and vastly prefer the 28-200 G as a walkaround lens to the purple-fringing king 70-300 G. There were also the 28-80 AF-G and 28-100 AF-G series Nikkors with the old screw-drive focusing. The still-current AF-DX Fisheye 10.5mm Nikkor is a G-series lens with screw-drive focusing. So there were/are at least five common G-series lenses that are not AF-S focusing models to my knowledge--perhaps there were one or two more, but I cannot recall. However, as far as I know, all of the "very-newest" G-series lenses are incorporating AF-S focusing; to my knowledge the 10.5 DX Fisheye was one of the last, transitional AF-G (screwdriver) focusing models Nikon will make. Moving forward, G-series lenses will probably all be AF-S models,and thus suitable for use on ALL the Nikon AF bodies of the current era.

To me, this isn't much of a worry, since I own only bodies that have in-built AF motors, since I own mostly Ai,Ai-S,ad AF-D lenses and want metering with manual focusing lenses and focusing with any AF lens I happen to have.


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## djacobox372 (Jan 16, 2010)

potownrob said:


> Can the sub-D200 Nikon bodies do stop-down metering like the Canons can do? With the Canons (at least the mid-level models like 10D+) I think you can use aperture priority mode with non-Canon lenses even though they can't communicate with the body, and the body meters off of the lens at whatever aperture it's set to (can't use G type lenses that don't have the aperture ring).



I don't thinks so, it's been my experience that you get ZERO metering information on non-cpu lenses, unless you're using a d200,d300, d700, or d2/d3.


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## potownrob (Jan 17, 2010)

djacobox372 said:


> I don't thinks so, it's been my experience that you get ZERO metering information on non-cpu lenses, unless you're using a d200,d300, d700, or d2/d3.


Thanks for your reply. From what I understand the Canons meter off the lens without any data being entered into the camera (like you would do with a D200+) whenever they don't detect a lens set-up for Canon cameras (with the aperture index or electronic circuit). Since the "incompatible" lens isn't being held open at max aperture, the camera can meter off the lens at whatever aperture it's set to. I'm hoping Derrel or one of the hard-core Canonites has experience with this .


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## Garbz (Jan 17, 2010)

Dwig said:


> AF-D: AF plus additional focusing distance data. Mechanical AF coupling like AF.



Thanks. Cleared it up much better than I did, but I still don't like the above line. Technically correct in the description but it doesn't belong in the list. D like G denotes the chip used in the lens, independent of their AF notation and also labelled at the end of the lens. The autofocus lenses are either AF or AF-S independent of the D or G.

e.g.
AF Zoom-Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8D ED
AF-S Zoom-Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8D IF-ED
AF-S VR Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED

Interestingly enough I just realised that the only thing Nikon is inconsistent about in their naming of the lenses is the VR designation.
AF-S Zoom-Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G IF-ED VRII is the successor to the above lenses...


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