Moving to Mirrorless: Attempting to go from Nikon D7200 to Nikon Z6 and totally confused about what I’ve been told. Person at Photo shop says i absolutely cannot use my current Nikon...

Djacks1 Loc: Edmond Oklahoma

Attempting to go from Nikon D7200 to Nikon Z6 and totally confused about what I’ve been told. Person at Photo shop says i absolutely cannot use my current Nikon DX lens on the Z6. Others say i can use them with the Z mount attachment but i will lose resolution and it will be cropped differently. So, what’s the truth?

clansman Loc: wendover,england

Cannot speak for Nikon, but Canon offer an adaptor and it does do well will DSLR lenses, no loss of res nor any negative cropping so I am sure Nikon will have wanted to be on the same level. Perhaps a Nikon w/site will show what is available.

mcmama

The D7200 is DX and the Z6 is a full frame, so unless I’m mistaken you won’t be able to get the intended use from your DX lenses. I think the photos will be distorted.

clansman Loc: wendover,england

Apologies, I did not think it through. I am sure Mcmama is much more accurate!

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Ask the UHH Mirrorless Evangelist.

RKL349 Loc: Connecticut

Djacks1 wrote:

Attempting to go from Nikon D7200 to Nikon Z6 and totally confused about what I’ve been told. Person at Photo shop says i absolutely cannot use my current Nikon DX lens on the Z6. Others say i can use them with the Z mount attachment but i will lose resolution and it will be cropped differently. So, what’s the truth?

You can use those lenses on the Z6, but only with the Ftz adapter. The Z6 is a full frame camera, your D7200 is not. The result will be the same as putting a DX lens on ax FX body. There are probably more technical answers and I do not consider myself expert enough to offer that advice.

cjc2 Loc: Hellertown PA

RKL349 wrote:

You can use those lenses on the Z6, but only with the Ftz adapter. The Z6 is a full frame camera, your D7200 is not. The result will be the same as putting a DX lens on ax FX body. There are probably more technical answers and I do not consider myself expert enough to offer that advice.

This is the CORRECT answer. If you have full-frame F mount lenses, using these with an FTZ adapter will work perfectly! The camera store sales person is totally incorrect. Best of luck.

GVC48507 Loc: Michigan

Your DX lenses will work on your Z camera using the F2Z adapter. The camera will automatically go into DX mode, using only a portion of the full frame sensor. I went from D 7000 to Z 7ii and have been unable to to find an override to keep it in FX mode. You lose resolution because of DX mode, your 24 Mb sensor will only use 1/1.5 of its sensor (16 Mb). All my F mount lenses work on my Z 7ii. The only issue is with lenses that require the AF motor on the camera; you have to manual focus.

R.G. Loc: Scotland

If you have a FTZ adaptor you can operate the Z6 in DX mode. There will be a drop in resolution to about 10.3 MP.

The field of view will be the same as what you got with your D7200.

ALam

I had a Z6 and tried a DX 10-20mm lens with FTZ adapter on my Z6 without any problems. I compared a picture with this lens with a picture with my 14-30mm Z lens and did not see much difference between the 2 lenses, the 10-20mm could become like a 15-30mm lens for FX camera. I did not check for the file size though. My camera backpack with my z6,24-70mm F/4, 14-30mm F/4, 60mm lens, FTZ, SB-5000 flash, and accessories from my camera backpack were stolen from my car break-in at Captains Tom's Seafood in Houston in September. I plan to keep this DX 10-20mm to use with my new Z6II for now. You might find the difference between the 2 lenses if you use with a high-resolution camera such as a Z7.

Strodav Loc: Houston, Tx

I am a Nikon shooter with a D7200 and Z9. I will never sell my D7200 as it is the most fun camera I have. It's in my photo shoulder go bag and used often for street photography. The 18-140mm kit lens is one of the best pieces of DX glass out there. I cannot recommend a Z6, or Z7 for that matter. They were Nikon's first foray in to mirrorless and were well behind the competition. At a minimum I'd go for a Z6 II, but even that is well behind the curve.

If you are looking at the Z6 because of price, I'd recommend selling all your Nikon stuff and looking at Canon, which has much better performance, especially AF, around the same prices for Nikon used gear.

The only Nikon mirrorless cameras I recommend are the Z8 (2023 camera of the year) and Z9. I mainly use my Z9 for birding and sports, and use my D7200 and D850 for most everything else.

Machinedoc Loc: Yorktown Heights, NY

I moved from a D7200 to a Z6ii this past June and have the FTZ adapter. If you put a DX lens on, the frame size goes from 36mm x 24mm to 3936mm x 2624mm. The DX lens is designed to cover the DX sensor which is smaller than an FX. See page 753 in the Z6 manual.

I do have some FX glass (not Nikkor) and they work wonderfully with the Z6. I really like the Z6!

ricardo00

Djacks1 wrote:

Attempting to go from Nikon D7200 to Nikon Z6 and totally confused about what I’ve been told. Person at Photo shop says i absolutely cannot use my current Nikon DX lens on the Z6. Others say i can use them with the Z mount attachment but i will lose resolution and it will be cropped differently. So, what’s the truth?

I would find a new photo store. It is amazing to me how a salesman at a photo store can give such poor info. The correct answer is in many of the responses above, you definitely can use a Nikon DX lens on the Z6 but you won't get the total benefit of switching to the Z6, so you should consider whether it is really worth switching to the Z6 and/or if you can afford a full frame lens (if you don't already have some).

User ID

cjc2 wrote:

This is the CORRECT answer. If you have full-frame F mount lenses, using these with an FTZ adapter will work perfectly! The camera store sales person is totally incorrect. Best of luck.

Slight addendum: make that "full frame F mount lenses with IN-LENS focus motors".

User ID

Machinedoc wrote:

I moved from a D7200 to a Z6ii this past June and have the FTZ adapter. If you put a DX lens on, the frame size goes from 36mm x 24mm to 3936mm x 2624mm. ..........

THAT !! would be rather astounding.

The lesson here is that the UHH clown car is not necessarily better than that camera store clerk. Its perfectly possible that the OPs DX lens is an old shaft drive AF lens that cannot AF on the FTZ converter. Photos attached.

If the OP will post pix of the ID nomenclature on his DX lens, or a good clear pic of the lens flange, this particular issue would be settled.

Observe at "7 oclock" on the body flange.

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Shaft drive AF coupling visible on lens flange.

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