Can you attach nikon f mount lenses to four thirds cameras?

I have some nice f mount Nikon/Nikkor lenses from some old film cameras and wondered wether it is possible to attach them to four thirds cameras like Olympus Pens, Nikon V1 or J1 etc etc

Using possibly an adapter ring.

No. There might be an adapter available, but you'll have no in-camera metering and no infinity-focus.

Although there are adapters available to allow mounting of your Nikkor lenses on the cameras you listed, why not just buy a Nikon DSLR and skip the adapter?

Truth be told, unless your Nikkor lenses are really exotic - like, perhaps a 50mm f1.2 - you'll quickly find that an adapter is more trouble than you'll want to deal with. The biggest headache will be stop-down metering. Compose the scene with the lens wide-open and then stop-down to the taking aperture you want to use, meter and then manually set the shutter speed. If you stop-down to, say, f8 or f11 or f16 you'll find the viewfinder so dark that little is visible. To check your composition you'd have to open up and then remember to stop-down again to the aperture you metered with.

Yes you can

Some combinations can't work because of flange reasons, aka how far the lens is of the sensor. So yes you can use lenses like the F mount the EF mount and so on on a well MFT system.

There are a few issues here, you lose autofocus and can lose metering. You can lose a few things that turn a pretty good lens into a lame duck.

In the best cases the adapter is chipped and the camera is fed false data, aka it beliefs it has a 50mm lens on it. In the worst case the adapter is not chipped. And this means you are forced into Manual Mode.

This means sadly allot of trial of error so the fun of shooting with non-standard mount lenses can be kinda pushed out of it.

Some cameras do have functions that aid with manual focussing that can elevate part of these issues. Like a small zoomed in screen in liveview or lets say.focus peaking as the Nex and Sony SLT range offers.

By the way the Nikon is not an MFT the sensor is yes bigger then compact camera sensors. BUT its smaller as MFT.

But yeah almost every brand has adapters that allow to use others lenses. BUT this tends to mean manual focus, manual mode, and if you are lucky you get some kind of focussing aid.

Please first note that Olympus PEN are not FourThirds the Pen and Panasonic G cameras are MICRO FourThirds (MFT), neither are Nikon V1/J1 cameras which use the Nikon 1-mount. Both the MFT and 1-mount can be adapted to run F-mount at infinity, additionally all other mirrorless systems (except Leica-M rangefinder) can be adapted successfully, i.e. Sony E, Samsung NX. Two SLR mounts are also easily adapted for F-mount, this is full FourThirds and Canon EF. Of all these systems only EF provides full frame capability. On MFT, FT, 1, E, NX mounts you will notice the lens is narrower than originally intended.

Additionally F-mount Nikkors have a lot of variation through the years, this make some lenses harder to adapt.

For J1/V1, you have the official FT-1 adapter, this gives you full compatibility on AI-P, AF-I and AF-S.AF lenses act as AI-P since the J1/V1 doesn't have AF motor.AI, and AI-S lenses don't have a coupling prong, but I believe the J1/V1 should still stop down meter. Pre-AI lenses need modification to the AI standard to function.

For other systems you are currently stuck with dumb or semi-smart adapters. Notably there's a F-EF semi-smart adapter for open apeture metering and auto stopdown on Canon EOS cameras allowing for full automatic exposure, this adapter is however very expensive. There isn't a smart adapter for other systems, which means only stop down metering works in aperture priority and manual modes. You also lose autofocus, and in the case of G-type lenses you will need to get a special G-type adapter which gives you the ability to stop down.

A glimmer of hope to MFT users, is that there currently is a MFT-EF smart adapter, if it's possible to make a smart adapter for the most automated (EF) mount, then it shouldn't be that hard to make a smart adapter for MFT-F.

Anyways, it's a whole confusing world of adapting lenses. If you don't know what you're doing just buy the real lenses. Sell the Nikkors, they're worth a lot, and some fool like me may end up buying them and using them on an EOS.