M42 Camera Adaptors - do they work

[dinki]

My daughter has bought a Nikon D31000 and has only one lens. My husband has a number of different lens for his manual Praktica camera and we have heard that it is possible to get a M42 camera adaptor which will enable her to screw these lens to her camera to save her the cost of buying expensive lens. She is 16 and going to college and wants to use the camera for arts/leisure purposes. Is anyone able to tell me more about the M42 and if it will work. If someone already has this camera and uses an adaptor can they advise.

Many thanks in advance

[Buenchico]

Using an M42 lens with a digital camera is likely to present many problems. The most obvious one is that an M42 lens is designed to focus an image onto a 35mm film frame, whereas digital cameras normally require a lens to focus the image onto a far smaller CCD array. Additionally you'd lose the metering functions of the camera, so that the manual settings would have to be used, together with a light meter.

See here:
http://www.techdot.eu...arison-by-dslr-brand/
and 'Use on modern cameras' here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M42_lens_mount

Chris

[dinki]

Thanks very much for the help. Love the photo - a bad hair day - you should see mine its like that all the time.