Nikkor Type V 55mm f1.2

 This lens was only made between 1965 and 1978, and the Type V, one of which I recently found myself on eBay, was produced after 1976. 34,000 were made. The coating is a little marred around the edge but that doesn't affect the image at all. It's the best part of half a kilo of Lovely Fast Glass. As it's a pre-AI lens it won't fit most of my bodies, the D200 or the F5, even the Fm2. However I had read that the F4 will take it, though you can't meter, and possibly the D40, which would be very handy indeed. Mr Gibbs is flying me over to Lancashire next week to shoot a wedding for him - silly boy has double-booked himself - I think he has one kicking around. I'll ask him to leave it on the kitchen table for me.

 Some Special Versions were made for NASA at the time. NASA lenses are extremely rare as you might imagine and it's said astronauts often leave them on the moon. I bet there's a rare collection up there.

 I had a play on the old beast, AKA the Mighty F4, and then I found an old F801 under the stairs. I thought I wrote that one off pot-holing under the rock of Gibraltar but it seemed to work, and the lens fitted! It was metering too, but not registering aperture changes so I guessed it was metering at 5.6 and compensated three or four stops. It was wonderful to shoot on film again, and what do you know, I didn't expose a shot wrong. Just like the old days, pre-pesky maverick digital. It's a little contrasty, but that could be the commercial scanning, however the depth of field is simply ridiculous when opened wide up and really rather lovely. There's more test samples in Sketchbook.