Nikon retro-inspired camera

[the_hunter]

If Nikon would only pick up where Konost left and make sure camera is responsive unlike mirrorless with their delayed wake up times and short battery life. The more I can forget about having to keep checking battery level , and presence of the extra buttons and features the more enjoyable expierience which is one of main reasons to wanting to go out take photos.

Agreed. Mirrorless cameras have a nice form factor but always seem to be slow, you say startup I say in shutter response. The short battery lives are also a big drawback. You would think they would put a small grip on the camera for easy holding a fill it with a modest battery... it is just common sense and it could easily be sold as a pro camera with a premium price tag.

 

[jsrockit]

So, it seems this rumor is a dud. Announcement came and went.

 

[farlymac]

So, it seems this rumor is a dud. Announcement came and went.

Yeah, most folks got all worked up over nothing. That's why when I'm over on Nikon Rumors when one of these stories crops up I usually just think "That would be nice, but it will never happen".

PF

 

[JeffS7444]

So, it seems this rumor is a dud. Announcement came and went.

Like buying a lottery ticket, it's cheap entertainment, with a slight chance that your wishes will be granted. 😀

 

[jarski]

I don't get it. The SP was not a very succesfull camera. Horrible viewfinder.

The Nikon S2 was a great camera (and still is). Why not a digital S2, with all its viewfinders, lenses and accessories that also can be used on the original S2?

Erik.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qMwZIdql3U

😕 looks pretty usable finder, and apparently is easy to find camera, so what constitues "not very succesful"?

 

[Highway 61]

The SP was not a very succesful camera. Horrible viewfinder.

😕 😕 😕 Uh ???

The Nikon S2 was a great camera (and still is). Why not a digital S2, with all its viewfinders, lenses and accessories that also can be used on the original S2?

Nikon never made any small, sleek and well designed digital camera which would have been dedicated to the huge line of their Ai and Ai-S lenses produced by zillions between 1977 and the last years (and which work, for most, very very very well with a 24MP FF sensor like the D610 or D750 ones) although there was clearly a market and a demand for such a thing : now you think they would or could make one for the confidential S-mount which didn't survive the 1950s ? Come on...

Let's use what we have, and what is available. Let's stop listening to those stupid rumors.

 

[jsrockit]

Like buying a lottery ticket, it's cheap entertainment, with a slight chance that your wishes will be granted. 😀

Perfectly stated... and once in a great while cameras (film and digital) that some RFF members love actually come to fruition.

 

[Erik van Straten]

In my eyes the Nikon SP was never as successful as the S2. The SP was completely forgotten on the moment the Nikon F appeared on the scene. The S2 was by then already out of production. Leitz had a very hard time to produce something like the Nikon F. The Nikon F, together with its small brother - the Nikkormat - almost killed all the competition. About fifteen years after the introduction of the Nikon F Canon presented their F1.

Erik.

 

[jonmanjiro]

The SP was completely forgotten on the moment the Nikon F appeared on the scene.

The SP was in production in parallel with the F for almost half its initial production run. Then, because the SP was not completely forgotten, in 1962-1963, a year or two after it was discontinued, a "reissue" batch of about 2,000 SPs was produced to satisfy demand from pros who wanted a smaller camera than an SLR for some photography situations. Nikon also released the newly designed and much better performing "Olympic" Nikkor 50/1.4 at that time. The serial numbers of the initial production run SPs are in the range 6200xxx to 6224xxx, and the serial numbers of this "reissue" batch are in the range 623xxxx, so these reissue SPs are easily identifiable from their serial numbers. Then, there's the SP 2005. Nikon reissued the S3 2000 in 2000, and because the SP was not completely forgotten, Nikon got many complaints asking why they didn't reissue the flagship SP instead. So Nikon went back to the drawing board and reissued the SP as the SP 2005 five years later.

 

[shawn]

Agreed. Mirrorless cameras have a nice form factor but always seem to be slow, you say startup I say in shutter response.

Shutter response varies quite a bit between systems. Never found it to be an issue with my x100v or old Xpro2. For fastest response on the A7RII I use electronic first curtain which saves the need to close the mechanical shutter before firing.

I think there is a little bit of delay sometimes in EVF systems that sort of appears to be slower shutter response too. The Olympus E5 OMD had that in my opinion.

Shawn

 

[Erik van Straten]

The SP was in production in parallel with the F for almost half its initial production run. Then, because the SP was not completely forgotten, in 1962-1963, a year or two after it was discontinued, a "reissue" batch of about 2,000 SPs was produced to satisfy demand from pros who wanted a smaller camera than an SLR for some photography situations. Nikon also released the newly designed and much better performing "Olympic" Nikkor 50/1.4 at that time. The serial numbers of the initial production run SPs are in the range 6200xxx to 6224xxx, and the serial numbers of this "reissue" batch are in the range 623xxxx, so these reissue SPs are easily identifiable from their serial numbers. Then, there's the SP 2005. Nikon reissued the S3 2000 in 2000, and because the SP was not completely forgotten, Nikon got many complaints asking why they didn't reissue the flagship SP instead. So Nikon went back to the drawing board and reissued the SP as the SP 2005 five years later.

As a Nikon fan, this history is more or less familiar to me. However, I am old enough to remember what the situation was like in the Netherlands - and in Europe - in the 1970s. In Europe, Nikon rangefinder cameras were completely unknown at the time. I myself only got to know these Nikon cameras from a 1983 copy of Robert Rotoloni's "Nikon Rangefinder Camera" that I found in a second-hand bookshop in Amsterdam in the mid-1990s. Even in American photo magazines that I read since the 1970s these cameras were never mentioned.

Erik.

 

[Highway 61]

In Europe, Nikon rangefinder cameras were completely unknown at the time.

Haha. I will add : like a complete unknown, with no direction home ! 😀 Look at the camera on that famous record cover, Erik. 😉

This is right to say that the Nikon RF gear was less known than its Leica sibling in Europe, but the completely unknown thing is just wrong. When I was a kid myself, i.e. in the mid 1970s, I used to go to Paris on a frequent basis with my father and we used to pass by a Nikon shop near the Gare Montparnasse, where we could see their collection of quite all the Nikon rangefinder gear on display in the flesh : bodies, lenses, hoods, external viewfinders, close-up accessories, flashes. I clearly remember that they had a Nikon SP with a W-Nikkor.C 2,5cm f/4 and its external viewfinder for instance, in front of which many men, my father included, were drooling.

Photo magazines, even American, of the 1970s and 1980s, quite never mentioned cameras which were out of production, was it through their articles or their ads. Which reader of the same magazines of that era could then discover things like the Leica IIIf and IIIg for instance ? Nil. When the Leica M6 got released and largely reviewed in the magazines in 1984, did this help people to discover the wonderful Leica M2 ? No it didn't.

My chrome SP comes from the 1962-1963 reissue batch of 2,000 units which Jon mentioned above. I feel very lucky to have, totally by chance, bought one of them, because it's probably the best built SP ever. I would define its viewfinder as just the contrary of "horrible". 😉

Yet, I am not waiting for a digital version of it, nor for digital versions of my Nikon S2 and S3, because Nikon will just never make any.

 

[Erik van Straten]

Of course I know this record by Dylan, but when the record came out I really didn't know that the camera on the cover was a Nikon. The Nikon F and the Nikkormats were known in Europe, but the rangefinder-Nikons really wasn't. In 1971 I was admitted to the photography course of the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam, then the Mecca of photography in the Netherlands, but really nobody there knew the Nikon rangefinders. The M-Leicas were well known - there was an M2 available for students to use - but the only 35mm cameras used were SLRs, mainly Nikkormats and Nikon Fs - as well as a few Canons. The rangefinder Nikons only became known in the Netherlands when the internet was available, via eBay and the like.

gelatine silver print (nikkor h 50mm f2) nikkormat

(1974)

Erik.

 

[Disappointed_Horse]

Beautiful photo Erik. Your work is an inspiration! (Both creatively and in that it inspired me to buy a 50mm f/2 Nikkor.)

 

[Erik van Straten]

Thank you, AAlfano!


Mine was a Nikkor H Auto 50mm f/2. I am thinking however to buy a Nikkor S Auto 50mm f/2 too.


Erik.

 

[Disappointed_Horse]

You're quite welcome! Mine is the "K" model, the last one before the AI model. I like that it focuses to 0.45m. I'd love to try Nikkor S Auto too, but have got it in my head that if I buy one of those, I want the early nine blade aperture version, which are hard to find for a reasonable price.

 

[Rob-F]

I don't know that it's reasonable or realistic to think that a fully functional full frame digital Nikon could be stuffed into something the size of an Fe2 or an F3, for example. I tried a Df in the store and didn't like it. It didn't feel right. And it's still not an Fe2 or F3 in size. I think the control layout and ergonomics of my D700 are just fine, and I have gotten used to the size. When I want something smaller, I use my Fuji X20 or X100 or a Leica/Panasonic.

 

[keytarjunkie]

I don't know that it's reasonable or realistic to think that a fully functional full frame digital Nikon could be stuffed into something the size of an Fe2 or an F3, for example.

Sony RX1 came out about 9 years ago and is absolutely tiny, fixed lens included. More recently we have seen cameras like the Leica M10, Sony A7C, Sigma Fp, even Hasselblad X1D which have large sensors in very compact bodies. Others can do it, although Leica is still the only one to put the sensor close to the traditional film plane. I was disappointed in many ways by the DF which is such a shame because in theory I would love it. I am not holding my breath for Nikon here unfortunately, but I’d love to be surprised!

 

[Disappointed_Horse]

I think it could be done, but not with a full frame sensor, auto focus, a big battery, and all the controls Nikon users have come to expect in a DSLR.

If you compare a Leica M7 to a M10, Leica got pretty close to a simple digital version of its film rangefinder, albeit heavier, and it took ten years of development over four iterations (M8, M9, M240, to the M10) to get to that point. Also, because M-mount lenses are all manual focus, Leica doesn't have to have a huge battery to power the motors of gargantuan full frame AF lenses.

The Fuji XT series are a pretty close match for the FM/FE series in size and weight, and have very similar control layouts, although obviously they are mirrorless and have APS-C sensors.

So, to get a digital camera down to the size of an FE, Nikon would have to either design it only for manual focus lenses or design it around an APS-C sensor. I don't see Nikon designing anything around old manual focus lenses, as there are millions of them on the used market and Nikon wants to sell us all new lenses. And, based on long experience with Nikon's DX DSLRs, I don't see them ever building out a full lineup of APS-C mirrorless lenses.

 

[Highway 61]

I don't know that it's reasonable or realistic to think that a fully functional full frame digital Nikon could be stuffed into something the size of an Fe2 or an F3, for example.

When you consider the size of the Leica M10 you know that it's very reasonable to think of a Nikon full frame DLSR the size and style of the FE2 or F3. There is no technical obstacle at all once you've got back to the good old clever and sleek design, without any idiotic pop-up flash, without any useless button or knob, without that pesky soap-box style molded polycarbonate outer shell. But Nikon will never make it, the train has passed by at some point and they haven't climbed onto it. Now it's gone far away and the story has come to an end. Nobody will re-write the missing chapter. I agree that the D750 and D610, both still easy to grab for not much off the 2nd hand market, are the best choice for Ai and Ai-S lenses people who didn't get caught by the Df marketing nudge. A split image screen sold by focusingscreen.com is a modest investment to help us to swallow the pill, and take advantage of the excellent 24MP FF sensor of those cameras (a better chip than the 16MP FF sensor of the Df, at the end of the day).

Looks like the left over choice, within the Nikon new digital stuff, will, sooner or later, be between one lone high-end DSLR (D6 and successors) and the Z gear, the latter fully replacing the "prosumer" DSLR models having been marketed until now. Nothing special to either rave or cry about.