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The often overlooked Nikkormat line of cameras is an excellent addition to anyone with a large selection of manual focus Nikon glass, both original Auto-Nikkor or the modern AI and AI-S glass. Sold as a consumer camera built to the same quality and specification as the professional Nikon cameras of the era, today, they have more of a cult following. While most people will gravitate towards the improved original Nikkormat FTn or the short-lived FT3, the FT2 is the forgotten middle child and is the ultimate Nikkormat. With backward and forward compatibility, a modern battery cell, over its life, never changed. Thanks to Bill SmithRead More →

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If there is one lens that helped put Nikon on the map, it is an 85mm lens. This lens traces back to when Nikon stepped into the camera market but had yet to make a worldwide splash. A Japanese and American photographer helped take the company to worldwide status, and a simple 85mm lens in Leica Thread Mount showed them the way. The 85mm f/1.8D helped continue that legacy and is one I have a unique viewpoint on. While I did use this lens in the past, I wasn’t too fond of it despite producing some fantastic results. The problem I only recently found outRead More →

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Everyone knows and loves the various cameras: FM, FE, FM2, FM2n, and FE2. But there are a series of cameras that are part of the minor F’s that make some significant technological splashes and some belly flops that are generally not as well known or are out of reach of the average photographers. These cameras were used to experiment with new technologies before they hit the big times with professional cameras. First is the Nikon FG, produced from 1982 to 1984; it was the first camera from Nikon to have full auto-exposure and semi-automatic and metered-manual modes. The Nikon FA, released in 1983, had aRead More →

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While we have given cameras like the F, F2, and F3 their own separate episodes, the final three “Big F’s” in Nikon’s lineup were more evolutions of each other and were a radical departure from the previous manual cameras of the group. So on today’s episode, we dig into the F4, F5, and the F6 to wrap this series up (finally). Like the original F, the F4 did not come out of a vacuum but rather from a combination of other cameras that acted as proof of concepts. The first is the Nikon FG which gave Nikon their first complete AE SLR, then the NikonRead More →

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The gift of a Nikon F80 kickstarted my deep dive into photography and a return of film as a medium in my toolkit. With the F80 came a selection of lenses; some were good, and others were cheap. And only one of the lenses (AF Nikkor 35mm f/2D) I got with that F80 remains intact in my kit today. But there was one lens from that kit that I missed the most, the AF Nikkor 24mm f/2.8D. As I mentioned in last month’s lens review, the D-Type lenses can carry a high price on the used market, but the Non-D lenses can be had forRead More →

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I’m a big fan of prime lenses; they have always been a go-to for working with SLRs. And I have many options for my auto and manual focus Nikon kits. And while I have all my preferred focal lengths in my manual kit, I have been lacking a couple of options in my autofocus kit. Sure I have two fantastic zoom lenses with missing focal lengths, but they are both heavy and awkward to bring along when size matters. The problem is that even today, AF-D lenses can fetch a high price on the used market. So when someone offered up a couple of second-generationRead More →

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Of late, I’ve had a soft spot for consumer-level SLRs. These are excellent options as knock-about cameras that often have the same internals as their professional cousins but in a smaller form factor and can be had for a low cost. The F65 is one of Nikon’s final entry-level SLRs and one of the best options for the era, as it combines form and functions and offers the greatest compatibility. While the F65 only saw production for a short period, its replacements split things into two sub-varients, a lower-spec F55 and a high-spec F75, the features on both are found in the F65. If you’reRead More →

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If you want a simple answer to the question, why the heck am I reviewing a camera that isn’t precisely designed for use above the water, that answer is, I’m crazy. And by crazy, I mean some lenses work both underwater and on dry land with the Nikonos III, and the lens that only lens I have available isn’t designed for dry land. But the Nikonos line holds a unique spot in photography’s history, specifically Nikon. There are two reasons for this. First, the Nikonos line was the camera that made underwater photography accessible, and two, it was the last camera to have a foundationRead More →

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In the world of speciality lenses, there is nothing more specialized than perspective-control or tilt-shift lenses. The idea was to give 35mm photographers some movement control that large and medium format photographers used to adjust perspective. While the level of control could never be as discrete as with a large format camera, a perspective-control or PC lens provided some form of tilt and shift to grant a photographer a way to recompose an image without moving the camera body itself. Nikon’s original release in 1962 as part of the Nikon F system presented the world with the PC-Nikkor 35mm f/3.5, a relatively simple lens withRead More →

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If there is one type of lens that many photographers look for in a good street photography camera or any compact camera body is a good pancake lens. And while Nikon is not known for producing many ‘pancake’ style lenses, they did have a couple of winners. One of these lenses is the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8, a real winner. In contrast, there have been many versions of this lens, including a long-nose version, the 50mm f/1.8 is a solid performer for the smaller form-factor camera bodies (think FM, FE) and while it may look like a Series E, it is all Nikkor. Lens Specifications Make:Read More →