camera reviews

Writing on Photography /  by Nathan Jones

In 2010/2011, I ran a film-photography blog called The Photon Fantastic (now defunct). During this time, I wrote several among the following series of articles as part of a larger, collaborative project called The Beginner's Guide to Film Photography, which unfortunately was never finished. I am collecting them here as a navigational aid for newcomers to this blog, and also as the first step in my own return to the project. I intend to complete the writing by mid-2025 and publish the guide as a book by the end of that year.

I've also written less technical, more philosophical, and much more opinionated articles about photography. They say I'm polarizing. Oh well.

I'm fascinated by the multitude of ways that photographers think and speak about their art. To my mind, photography is a very slippery thing and it takes a lot of thinking to penetrate the surface of what it is. Here's a (growing) collection of thoughts on photography by great practitioners and critics.

If you’re interested in the tools of the trade, I have begun to write detailed experiential and technical reviews of the cameras in my collection, beginning with the Nikon bodies. To date these are:

Mechanical. Rugged. Reliable. My review of the Nikon FM2 now Published /  by Nathan Jones

The Nikon FM2 enjoyed a production run of almost two decades—and for most of that time, it was an anachronism, even by Nikon’s own standards. When the FM2 was released in 1982, the electronically controlled FE, which included aperture-priority auto-exposure—a feature conspicuous for its absence in the FM2—had already been in production for 4 years; only a year later, Nikon unveiled the “technocamera” or FA, which premiered what came to be known as matrix metering and also incorporated shutter-priority auto-exposure for the first time in a Nikon body; and, at the same time, the company added autofocusing to its flagship camera, in the F3AF model. Until the time the FM2 was finally discontinued in 2001, Nikon continued to iterate its professional line of cameras, including introducing the F4 (1988) and the F5 (1996), while only giving the FM2 a modest upgrade (in 1984, to the FM2N, which featured a new, titanium-bladed shutter and an increased X-sync speed from 1/125 s to 1/250 s). Nikon’s high-end line also underwent an evolution during this period, including introduction of the F90 (1992), F90x (1996), and F100 (1999) series of semi-professional cameras, while the FE was upgraded to the comparatively short-lived FE2 (1983-1987). In its consumer offerings, Nikon experimented across a wide range of cameras with plastic components, new form factors, and electronically-controlled, automatic shooting modes tailored to beginning photographers. And all the while, the venerable, rugged, reliable FM2 looked on, essentially unchanged, inheriting none of these improvements. The frothy competition between the major Japanese brands in the 1980s and 90s gave rise to many innovations, some useful and others faddish. This “progress” in camera technology left the FM2 behind—and yet, the camera only appreciated in value and found its way into the bottom of many a professional’s camera bag as a trusty back-up. The FM2 was a loyal friend that could be relied upon to keep shooting when batteries died and temperatures reached –40 ℃.

Continue reading …

Nikon F100 Review /  by Nathan Jones

Nikon F100 with mounted 58 mm f/1.4 Voigtländer Nokton manual focus lens.

This is the third in my trilogy of reviews of late-model film cameras manufactured by Nikon. The three cameras I cover–the F65, the F80, and, here, the F100–represent the culmination of design, engineering, and manufacturing expertise built by Nikon over four decades since the introduction of the legendary F1 in 1959. Though occupying positions spanning the entirety of Nikon’s amateur market segments, from entry level to prosumer, these three cameras share many technologies and features (some of which would later become incorporated into early digital offerings). Though constructed of different materials and ranging in size and weight, the cameras share a common design language and have similar ergonomics and haptics. Finally, the cameras are united by the fact that all of them were discontinued in 2006, approximately three years before I began taking photography seriously as a hobby. The only film camera produced by Nikon after this time was the flagship F6, which may be the finest 35 mm SLR film camera ever made.

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First Camera Review: Nikon F65 /  by Nathan Jones

The Nikon F65 film camera, with 28-80 mm f/3.3-5.6G kit lens in silver

Behold the alluring beauty of the Nikon F65 film camera! The svelte, polycarbonate, turn-of-the-century stylings! The “champagne” silver!

The heart melts.

In 2002, I paid $500 for this camera when I was a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Alberta in Edmonton—though I had absolutely no money at the time. And though the F65 featured at the bottom of Nikon’s lineup of amateur cameras, it was more “professional” than any camera I had ever before held, let alone owned. The Nikon F65, pictured above with the 28-80 mm f/3.3-5.6G kit lens, was my first serious camera, and I was overjoyed to make photographs with it. In those days, I carried it with me everywhere in the blue, Nikon-branded shoulder bag that I purchased at the same time, and which I still use everyday.

I have owned and used dozens of other cameras since buying the F65, most of them more “serious” and “professional,” not to mention much more valuable and collectible than the lowly Nikon. However, this little electromechanical marvel, despite its many weaknesses, occupies a special place in my heart and in my growth as a photographer—even as an artist—and for that reason, I’ve chosen to begin my new series of camera reviews with it.

Read the review.