Question about lens adapters

I tried to search for a answer but didn’t find any so had to ask.

Have been doing photography for a long time. I planned on starting to film videos. Have a older Nikon D800 with plenty of lenses. Did get a videoassist 3g for it. Never really got started and decided I’ll probably won’t be happy with 1080p and that my Nikon is not actually meant for videos.

Now after searching for options, I need help. Most likely my choice is pocket cinema camera 4k or 6k or micro studio camera 4k. The budget options. But wouldn’t really like to switch the whole inventory of lenses.

Adapters are available. Manual focus works, almost all of lenses have manual aperture control too. So shooting itself won’t be a problem. But these cameras seem to want metadata for gyro data. For Nikon lenses there is only one adapter to mft that has contacts to lens. Others are just adapters. Is manually inputting the data just a hassle or will I miss out something.

Or will I do fine that way or should I get fully compatible lenses? Need opinions on this to consider all options.

Best regards
Ville Jalonen

First lesson you should learn is:
Don’t buy anything until after NAB2025, the first weekend of April.

Video does differ from still photography and one of those differences is data collection. For my still photography (large format Pt/Pd from film) for each shot, I would write down all settings, data, time, and other information onto a custom form that was in a pocket sized note pad. This info had several uses such as processing information, exposure and planned development times (additional notes were made for the processing info for each negative and for each print,) a reminder of what equipment was used and settings, notes on conditions like whether and lighting and general notes.

For digital I do enter the lens/ filter data into the camera metadata. Rarely will I enter the aperture used. I will have my name as the cinematographer. The project name is only entered entered for actual projects as well as a director's name. I will enter the slate data if I will be using that data for sorting shots later. Many times I enter meta data after reviewing in Resolve, again for sorting and finding clips.

I have one purpose for electronics in the mount and that is to operate an EF lens. I have two EF mount lenses. One a 100-400mm Canon telephoto. The other a Zeiss Otus 28mm. By the way, the Otus was originally the Nikon mount version with manual aperture, converted to EF along with Duclos gears. So one lens that necessitates electronic connection. And I am now using a Tokina 1.6x Expander with a DZO Arles 180mm for wildlife, all with PL mount and no electronics.

Now to the point. Electronic mounts are not necessary unless there is a specific purpose of either controlling a lens or recording real time data from a lens. One purpose might be controlling parallax correction when using a video wall backdrop. So, first thing is to understand your limits as to what and how filming. Keep in mind that metadata such as the focal length, can be entered manually. Data has it's uses, but if you do not really need real time data it is better to go without - cheaper, less complicated and less to go wrong. In the cinematography I now do, I have really no need for electronic mounts, unless I go back to using that Canon lens... and I like data.

Have you considered sticking with Nikon? The latest Z series mirrorless cameras have a lot of advanced video features and you could use your existing lenses with the FTZII adapter. AF works for video tracking with most F mount AF lenses except for AFD lenses as far as I know which can be a big advantage. Most metadata is automatically captured and can be read in Nikon NX Studio. There is no gyro stabilisation though.

Thanks to Rick for a suggestion. Maybe I’ll have to wait NAB2025 first. Thanks to Jeffrey for detailed reply. So everything goes quite as I thought.

Have you considered sticking with Nikon? The latest Z series mirrorless cameras have a lot of advanced video features and you could use your existing lenses with the FTZII adapter. AF works for video tracking with most F mount AF lenses except for AFD lenses as far as I know which can be a big advantage. Most metadata is automatically captured and can be read in Nikon NX Studio. There is no gyro stabilisation though.

I actually had z6 ii at some point and with the frz adapter so works perfectly. But didn’t like photography wise of the mirrorless. I want the image to have a texture and older dslrs are better for me in this. Plus didn’t like the feeling that mirrorless made you to rely more on screen than to your knowledge.

But now that you mention it going back to mirrorless could be an option. Swapping the camera and obviously also bm video assist to support higher resolution.