Do old film slr camera lenses work on new dslr cameras?

I want to buy a nikon dslr camera and my dad has an old nikon film slr with a few lenses and I thought I could save some money if I used his old lenses instead of buying new ones.

Some digital SLRs can use old lenses. Some are smaller and require smaller diameter lenses.

Yes and no.

If you buy a Nikon other than the entry level dSLR's like the D7000, you can use ANY of the Nikkor AF, AF-I and AF-S lenses as well as any of the Nikkor manual focus lenses that are AI (auto-indexing) type

You'll lose metering and autofocus, but they will form an image.

Remember the 1.5x crop factor, though, a wideangle for 35mm becomes a standard on a cropped sensor - it does amazing things to the reach of a telephoto. Just make sure they're AI.

All AI and AF lenses will fit onto all modern Nikon DSLR cameras. The amount of functionality you get will vary. Pre-AI lenses need to be modified slightly to fit on, but is essentially the same mount.

D40, D60, D3000, D3100, D3200, D5000, D5100 - AF-S, and AF-I lenses will function fully.AF, and AI-P lenses are manual focus but with full metering.AI, and AI-S lenses non-metering.

D50, D70-D90, D7000, D100 - AF-S, AF-I, AF lenses function fully.AI-P lenses manual focus.AI, AI-S no metering.

D200, D300, D700, D800, D1, D2, D3, D4 - AF-S, AF-I, and AF fully functional.AI-P lenses are manual focus.AI, AI-S stop down meter when lens data is imput correctly.

Meanwhile if you bought a Canon DSLR and adapted the lens, all of them equiate to running AI lenses with stop down metering. So if your father has a camera from the 1980s or older then you're better off fitting your Nikon lenses to a Canon camera via adapters, as you can buy a £300 Canon body, rather then buying a £1000 Nikon body for the same amount of functions. However if your father has a Nikon from the 1990s or later, then it makes more sense to get a D90 as this can take advantage of the motorless AF lenses.

Nikon; yes.

Canon; maybe, maybe not.