Bower Ultrawide Fisheye Problems on Nikon

[ellisonms]

I recently purchased a Bower 8mm F3.5 Ultra-wide Fisheye Lens (SLY 358N) for my D40 X and am experiencing several problems:

1. The lugs on the camera body and the lens line up but it is EXTREMELY hard to twist the lens to the locked position. So hard, in fact, that my wife can't do it (even though all of our other lenses spin on VERY easily).

2. Once mounted, there is no visual change through the view finder when the focus ring on the lens is turned.

3. If a photo is taken, the pictures are VERY dark, with only the sun or a bare light bulb showing, even with the aperture wide open.

I have set both the top knob and the electronic menu to "Manual".

I'm hoping that this is an "Operator Error" problem because I'm stationed in the Armed Forces overseas and returning the lens for refund or repair may not be an option.

Thanking you in advance,

Mike

[Shadowman]

Most of the reviews state that it is difficult to attach to the camera and only works in manual mode.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...8mm_f_3_5.html

[Nomadr]

does it work on a full frame sensor ? ,
"If a photo is taken, the pictures are VERY dark, with only the sun or a bare light bulb showing, even with the aperture wide open."
what F stop and shutter speed are you using ? it would be great if you could post a pic, cheers martyn

[inkista]

does it work on a full frame sensor ? ,

No, the Rokinon/Samyang/Bower/Vivitar/Phoenix/etc.etc. 6.5mm/7mm/8mm fisheye (really, they're all the same lens) is designed for crop.

I'm a Canon shooter, so I may not have this quite right, but don't you lose metering completely on the entry-level bodies with manual lenses? That would explain the exposure issues. Your AE system can't do anything without accurate metering, so you'll need to guesstimate, chimp, and adjust to get your exposure where you want it. I'd highly recommend learning about histograms.