Apparently, yes, you can you shoot portraits with a smashed up rear lens element

So many of us baby our gear. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Despite the fact that the odd scratch here and there isn’t going to affect the performance of my kit, I’m still going to try to take the best care of it that I can. But sometimes accidents happen.

And an accident is what happened to Christopher Hamberger when he dropped his $1,200 Nikon 35mm f/1.4 Ai-S lens and shattered the rear element. Can it still shoot, though? How will that decimated rear element affect the images? Well, there’s only one way to find out. Shoot with it.

As if the uncertainty of a smashed rear lens element weren’t risky enough, Christopher also chose to shoot on film. His weapon of choice in this instance is the legendary Nikon F3 with Portra 400 film. Although the lens was no longer able to stop down beyond f/2.0 and focusing became very difficult, the results aren’t really all that bad and offer quite an interesting look.

I’m still going to baby my gear, though. But if I do ever happen to break a lens, I might have to try shooting with it anyway.

[via FStoppers]