In = Nikon E-Series, Out = Nikon 35mm 1.8G DX

Well, in the past week I've bought a Nikon 35mm 1.8G AF-S DX....and got a refund on it. I'd wanted it as it was a 50mm equivalent prime with 1.8f, it *should* have been light and fun and giving beautiful shallow DOF and great bokeh....

Using it on my D5000 caused a CONSTANT backfocus problem - spot focusing on a person's eye, quite close up, using the camera's AF, made the photo actually come out with the ear in focus and the eye out of focus. Where the subject is further away the distance between where you focused and where the focus actually comes out, increases. I'd bought the lens from a proper professional photography shop (ie not Comet or Jessops) and I could tell that they didn't believe me, but it did the same with another lens off the shelf, and it did the same when the Nikon Professional staff took the photos! I'd taken well over 300 photos testing the lens, thinking that I must be doing something really, really stupid to make it always be focusing on the wrong point regardless of the subject's distance, the aperture, shutter speed etc etc. TBH I thought that perhaps it had been dropped so something was out of line. One of the staff insisted that there was a setting on my camera to fine tune the focus, for just this sort of occurrence, but they looked it up on the internet and the D5000 isn't expensive enough for that option, and while they were at it they found that this DX lens causes exactly this back-focus problem on all Nikon's DX bodies. Shite. I was given a refund, but I'd much rather have had that lens, but one that worked properly, I'd been so excited about it :¬(

That was until.....I finally dared to turn the old Nikon E-Series 50mm 1.8f (~70mm equivalent on my D5000) that I'd bought for £7.50 in a charity shop, the day after I bought the 35mm 1.8 DX for £170, to the point of clicking into place on the camera body. I'd been too scared previously, paranoid that I wouldn't be able to get it off again and it'd have to be sent off to Nikon for weeks on end to get it removed (and have to pay for the privilege). Being an old e-series, the aperture and focussing are manual, (the camera has to be set to manual too, one of the Nikon Professionals told me that the camera would just flash ERROR! ERROR! at me as it didn't have the right connections, but I knew that wasn't true) there is no Image Stabilisation, there is no metering........but I love it!!!!! The metering I'm going to have to learn to guesstimate, and the focal length is a little longer than I wanted, but the photos are lush! In fact when I say there is no autofocus, that's not totally true, as the little green dot in the viewfinder that normally lights when the AF has locked on, lights up when it thinks the centre of frame is in focus, I like this, but prefer to use my eye to fine-tune the focus.

And it comes off my camera again!!! £7.50!!!!!

Edit: Oooooooh I look frowny when I'm photographing :¬S