Tim V
Member
Hello all,
It has been many years since I posted on RFF in any real capacity. So long that my account died with an old email address that I cancelled…
Anyway, I was a very long and dedicated Leica user until pragmatics of professional needs and family life saw me selling off all my prized M gear. Now, I’m able to shoot a lot more for pleasure and have been using a very nice and fully serviced Contax iiia with Zeiss-Opton 35mm and 50mm lenses - found kit buried in a box at local camera shop and couldn’t resist, although a good service cost about the same as the entire package… anyway…
I love the setup, well, all except the viewfinder - it’s serviceable but small and I miss seeing framelines and what I’m cropping out, a la with the Leica M3.
The Contax has given me the bug again, and has got me seriously thinking about a Nikon S2 primarily for the big, bright VF, but also because I could supposedly use my beautiful 35mm on it without too much worry about focus issues (I’d need a 50mm Nikkor to make use of the internal framelines, and use an external VF for the 35.) I mostly use the 50mm lens, hence prioritising the internal VF for that. I’d use the iiia body and Zeiss 50mm as a backup.
I’m lucky that my good friend is a professionally trained and practicing camera repair person, and he worked on my Contax to fix its lagging shutter. He said it was a bit of a nightmare and took him ages to get right, even though he has very good measuring equipment etc. (I seem to remember it took him 12 hours.)
I’m wondering if the Nikon is easier to work on and fine tune? Is the shutter less complex and more forgiving on the service side, and is the rangefinder easy to recalibrate if I find one that’s off or gets knocked out in transit? Some I’ve picked up in the past have ‘squeaky’ focus, is that easily solved?
I always wanted to try a Nikon RF. Past experience / love and wisdom might suggest I should just get another M3, but the Nikon’s price is more attractive and to be honest, I’m kinda keen on a more idiosyncratic user experience!
thanks in advance for the advise,
Tim
It has been many years since I posted on RFF in any real capacity. So long that my account died with an old email address that I cancelled…
Anyway, I was a very long and dedicated Leica user until pragmatics of professional needs and family life saw me selling off all my prized M gear. Now, I’m able to shoot a lot more for pleasure and have been using a very nice and fully serviced Contax iiia with Zeiss-Opton 35mm and 50mm lenses - found kit buried in a box at local camera shop and couldn’t resist, although a good service cost about the same as the entire package… anyway…
I love the setup, well, all except the viewfinder - it’s serviceable but small and I miss seeing framelines and what I’m cropping out, a la with the Leica M3.
The Contax has given me the bug again, and has got me seriously thinking about a Nikon S2 primarily for the big, bright VF, but also because I could supposedly use my beautiful 35mm on it without too much worry about focus issues (I’d need a 50mm Nikkor to make use of the internal framelines, and use an external VF for the 35.) I mostly use the 50mm lens, hence prioritising the internal VF for that. I’d use the iiia body and Zeiss 50mm as a backup.
I’m lucky that my good friend is a professionally trained and practicing camera repair person, and he worked on my Contax to fix its lagging shutter. He said it was a bit of a nightmare and took him ages to get right, even though he has very good measuring equipment etc. (I seem to remember it took him 12 hours.)
I’m wondering if the Nikon is easier to work on and fine tune? Is the shutter less complex and more forgiving on the service side, and is the rangefinder easy to recalibrate if I find one that’s off or gets knocked out in transit? Some I’ve picked up in the past have ‘squeaky’ focus, is that easily solved?
I always wanted to try a Nikon RF. Past experience / love and wisdom might suggest I should just get another M3, but the Nikon’s price is more attractive and to be honest, I’m kinda keen on a more idiosyncratic user experience!
thanks in advance for the advise,
Tim