Nikon FM vs Nikkormat FT3. Opinions?

[tunalegs]

"F" for Fuketa.

Mr. Masahiko Fuketa was the chief designer of the Nikon F.

I have to be honest, but that sounds like an "interesting story" of the sort old folks tell about such things. Although I guess there is no reason F could not mean a number of things.

 

[68degrees]

I have to be honest, but that sounds like an "interesting story" of the sort old folks tell about such things. Although I guess there is no reason F could not mean a number of things.

I want to see documentation. hehe

 

[68degrees]

I just want to thank everyone who contributed to this thread, it really helped me a lot to decide on the FT3 which I just found a nice one and I have to say that for me the winner is ......drum roll....... The FT3.

 

[jonmanjiro]

I thought F stood for flex as in reflex. I seem to recall reading that Nikon went with "F" over Flex or Reflex because it was easier to pronounce.

I can assure you that the pronunciation thing is nonsense. The Japanese word for SLR is 一眼レフ (pronounced ichi gan refu) which they have no trouble pronouncing 🙂

I have to be honest, but that sounds like an "interesting story" of the sort old folks tell about such things. Although I guess there is no reason F could not mean a number of things.

I want to see documentation. hehe

I agree that it does sound like an "interesting story" of the sort old folks tell. But if the word of the gentlemen in the photo that I linked is not sufficient, I also have to wonder what would constitute sufficient proof. There may be some documentation about it remaining from those days, but unfortunately we can no longer ask the three people sitting on Robert Rotoloni's right in the photo where that documentation might be, as they all passed away over ten years ago.

There are other examples in the Japanese photographic equipment industry of the designer naming a camera they designed. One I can think of is the Olympus OM-1, which was originally named the Olympus M-1 after its designer Mr. Yoshihisa Maitani (described on Olympus's website here so we can take that to be fact 😉). Leica didn't take too kindly to that name though, and Olympus was forced to change the name (changed to OM-1) not long after the camera was released.