New forum for Nikon rangefinder

Seems fitting to put this as my 2,500th post.

The SP in near mint condition is fetching over $2K, and most on EBay are "gunning" for $2,500 and up. The SP is most popular with collectors. A user conditon camera will cost half that. The S2 in EX+ condition will go for ~$700 with an F1.4 lens.

The Nikon S3 seems to be at a low-point. I have seen them go for below $1,000 in user condition with a lens, and below $1,500 for EX+ with a CLA. The S3 has bright lines for 105mm, 50mm, and 35mm lenses. The latter "Pushes" the edge and is hard to see with glasses. The 50mm lines are easily visible with glasses. The S3 has the "modern" single shutter speed dial that does not rotate.

Nikkor lenses go for less in S-Mount than the same lens in Leica Thread Mount. A Canon 7 will cost less money for the body, but equipping it with lenses can run the total cost back up. The Nikon's are quieter than the Canon 7, and are smoother operating to my touch. I rotate through the Canon 7, Nikon SP, Nikon S3, and Leica M3 for most of my shooting.

With all that said, if you can drop $2K for a classic camera in EX+ condition, get a Nikon SP. Nothing else quite like it. The viewfinder on the M3 is better, and the shutter is quiter. The Canon 7 is about 10% of the cost and has a great finder, steel curtains, and a meter. But the SP is probably the "coolest" camera of all time. Not than I am biased.
 
To almontriv,

I, too, am new to the forum and signed up because it seems to include a lot of people who actually shoot with their cameras.

I'm also a longtime Nikon rangefinder user. I was an Army photographer in the 1980s, and my colleagues and I favored Nikon Fs and Nikkormats for their ruggedness, plus they were cheap and plentiful at pawn shops. I eventually got a job as a newspaper reporter that involved shooting photos for my stories. Visiting a camera shop in Germany in 1988, I found an old Soviet Kiev, a Contax copy, and bought it. When I asked about the availability of lenses, the shopkeeper explained that Nikons had used the mount back in the 1950s. I was intrigued and, within a few months, had aquired an Nikon S2 at a camera show in Munich, along wit hwith a 50mm 1.5 sonnar and some Russian lenses, the 35mm 2.8 and the Orion 28 f/6. A few months after that, the same dealer had a Nikon S3, which came with a Nikkor 50mm f/1.4, the quality of which stunned me (but it does have distracting out-of-focus highlights, which people call bokeh). By the end of 1990, I had ordered a user-condition SP from a New York camera dealer, along with several lenses, and was doing 75 percent of my newspaper work with Nikon rangefinders. In the late 1990s I moved back to the United States from Europe and now have a job that involved just writing, with only very infrequent photography, so I mostly use the cameras to photograph my two daughters.

In my opinion, Nikon RFs have some huge advantages. Number one is that 100 percent finder. I'd been using Nikons for several years before I found out Leicas don't have a 100 percent finder. I shoot with both eyes open. As a journalist, that makes a phenomenal difference. I'm not hiding behind a camera. I'm still looking the subject in the eye and conversing with him or her. With practice, you can frame the S3 for the 28mm lens as well as the 85mm and 135mm, which aren't in the etched frames. The SP finder shows more lenses, and it's such a first-rate camera. But I always found it a bit dark, a lot harder to focus (my example is really beat up) and I never much liked squinting through the little 28mm finder. Still, I alternate between the S3 and the SP, probably using each equally. I spray-painted the face plates black just to make the cameras less conspicous. People are much less self-conscious when being photographed by a rangefinder -- especially when I'm looking at them -- than by a photographer squinting from behind an enormous modern SLR. And the focus wheel lets me handle it and compose the scene with one hand.

My avatar shows my five-year-old daughter a couple of months ago when I let her play with the essentially indestructable S2 and Sonnar. I took the picture with my S3 and 85mm wide open at f/2. Her picture shows exactly why I love that 100-percent field of view. She naturally kept both eyes open, and the controls fell naturally under her uncoached fingers.

I tend to carry either of the bodies, plus five lenses: a 28 f/3.5, a 35 f/1.8 (dynamite lens), a 50mm f/1.4 (also magnificent, but my copy shows some ghosting, creating ring halos when wide open and backlit, perhaps because of edge separation), an 85 f/2 and a 135 f/3.5. I also own a 105mm f/2.5 which is excellent, but I prefer the 85/135 combo because I do a lot of telephoto work (which is so easy with the 100 percent finder). And I have a Zeiss Biogon 21mm f/4.5, which is beautiful and heavy and requires a separate finder (Leica in my case -- In 1994 I was mobbed by children in Goma, Zaire, and one of them grabbed my 21mm finder, so I had to mail order another. I sometimes wonder whatever became of it and whether the now-grown youngster who snatched it still sometimes gazes through it in a contemplative mood to see the whole wide world at once).

I was never happy with the 21/28/35 combo, a tradeoff between width and speed. If I were still shooting for work today, I'd carry a CV 25mm F/4 instead of the 28mm Nikkor. But my wife points out that my cameras have been working just fine for half a century, so there's no need to buy any new ones now.
 
35mm F2.5 RF lens question

35mm F2.5 RF lens question

Hello
great to see a Nikon RF forum within this site.
I use a Nikon S3 2000 with the 50 1.4 and and 10.5 F2.5 (1957) alongside my Leica M6 on a regular basis and am considering a wideangle 35mm 2.5 chrome version for the S3. Has anyone any views on this lens - how would it compare with the recently discontinued Voitlander SC 35mm F2.5 lens?

Many thanks

Simon Larbalestier
www.simon-larbalestier.co.uk
contactme@simon-larbalestier.co.uk
 
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The Nikkor 3.5cm f2.5 is sharp and contrasty. It will give a modern lens a run for its money. I do not have the Cosina lens, only the Nikkor.

Remember that the 3.5cm F2.5 has stayed in production long after the RF's were discontinued, it is the basis of the Nikonos "normal" lens. It is a fine performer, that had to live in the shadows of the much scarcer 3.5cm F1.8 lens.

Here is a previous thread with some samples of various Nikkors.

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7636
 
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Thanks Brian that was exactly the info i wanted to hear.
Simon
 
Or you could save ~$7,800 and stick with the 3.5cm F2.5. This is the 3.5cm F2.5 wide-open, right after I took the 10.5cm F2.5 off of the S3.

Full frame, then blow-up of the center with scanner at max-res.
 
My grandfather only owned a mint SP in my dreams. An SP brings out the bidders like a mint IIIG except you have to have a bigger wallet for the SP
 
My Nikon RF story, or Love at first use.

I have a modest collection of RF cameras, all of which I use. If I don't use a camera, or just don't like it I sell it. About two years ago I was browsing the vintage rangefiner section of ebay and came across an S-2 with a chrome 50 1.4 at what appeared to be a reasonable BIN price. I didn't have a Nikon in my collection so I asked a couple of questions got the right answers and bought it. It showed up as advertised with the IB, a Nikon fan flash and a pretty good ER case. I looked at it, fondled a little and put it in the cabinet.

A few weeks ago I decided that I needed an R-D1 so looked for some things to sell. (This plan went awry as all the money I raised had to go to a new roof, but that's life.) There sat the unused, by me, S-2. There's a candidate I thought, but just to be fair I better put a roll through it just to make sure it works for whoever I sell it to. I took it on a long weekend with a few rolls of Scala.

Joe, please forgive me, but when I got back I sold my Canon P to a forum member and wished that I had the price of an SP and more lenses. There is something about this camera that just fits my way of working and seeing. It suits me perfectly and now is my camera of choice. I can't explain it, it just is.
 
I liked the S2, but it was so similar to the Contax, and I had many more lenses for IT, that I decided to stay with it, selling the S2 to MPEX. Won't do THAT again, but also, won't own another Nikon rangefinder until I can get an SP.
The SP, in my opinion, is just a very useful camera. The S2 is much less so, for my purposes- framelines, no built in wide finder, and so forth.
Understood that the finder isn't as bright as a Leica of the same era, but I'm betting there's someone out there with access to flat, thin, MC glass for use in the rangefinder windows that could brighten things considerably...

I'd like an SP someday. I'm working off that 28mm Elmarit nag, though. Next year, perhaps.
 
"THIS" is a great price. And tempting. Now that the SP-2005 is out, the S3-2000 prices have dropped. But, I have one rule. If my camera checking account can't handle it, I do not buy it. I had enough saved for a new S3, but spend it on Dan's (meleica) Nikon SP instead.

Think I'll go look at it again...
http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=9599
 
I'm a Nikon rf lower too

I'm a Nikon rf lower too

If i remember some mounth ago just was here a nikon rf forum....
I'm more interested in it, i'm a nikon rf lower and like me to try to repair this kind of old cameras... difficult to find a place to interchange opinions....
 
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