What decision did you make?
Nikon SLR recommendation
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What decision did you make?
You would be hard-pressed to find a better camera than the FA!
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I purchased my FA new shortly after Nikon announced it was discontinued and still own and use it. I don't recommend buying one today. Despite all of the 1980's concern about polycarbonate, the weak spot of this camera is the flexible circuit board. Unfortunately, the materials used get stiffer with age and can fail as a result. When they do, the only source of parts is cannibalization, meaning the circuit board is likely to be just as old and vulnerable as the one you replaced. Perhaps in a few years it'll be practical to "print" one at home. The LCD displays are a somewhat less common point of failure, but still of concern.
The FA also has a couple of "quirks." The first is that the AMP metering system is unaware of camera orientation, so it can get "fooled" when shooting verticals. The second is a lack of exposure lock.
If you want to use pre-autofocus lenses in shutter priority or program modes, it's the best choice from Nikon and one of the best overall. But I don't think I've used either mode with the FA since I got my F100.
I don't think so! I would prefer the the FM, FE and F3 to the FA.
I find the FA to be of interest analytically, but not practically. For the OP's preferences and intended uses, I still think four Nikons shine above the others: the EL, the EL2, the FE, and, yes, the FG. The F3 is beyond the OP's price preferences, or I would include it as well.
The EL is a rolling train-wreck, and the FE is a ticking time bomb!
F or F2
I replaced an unreliable Miranda with a Nikon F in 1967, and see little advantage in upgrading to anything newer. Along the way I did try Nikkorex F, FM10, EL, and Nikkormat. The idiosyncratic Nikkormat served well.
I do not use 35mm much at all anymore, but do travel with a Contax G1 and three lenses from time to time. That said, when I was in the wedding business my Reception camera was a Nikon FE2 with a 555 Sunpak potato masher dedicated flash. I could sync at 1/250th of a second and that sucker work it's butt off and never gave me a lick of trouble. One fine Nikon. I also shot available light shot with a F2AS for those staged candle lighting type scenes. My main camera was medium format, but those two Nikons never got me any complaints from mom or the bride as to not being good enough. Both those cameras are gone now, but I did get a very nice F4S and a 8008S. It would have been a breeze to use those to shoot receptions. I thought I would never have a camera as good as the Nikon F2AS I had, but the F4S is a dream camera and at the prices they go for now it's a no brainer. They also work extremely well as a manual focus camera with older Nikon MF glass while retaining the metering features unlike some of the Nikons that cripple them when using older lenses. Still, I think when it comes to used Nikon cameras nothing beats the 8008S for the best damn camera for the buck out there. It's a buyers market so I'd buy several different models that might interest you, try them and unload the ones that don't fit your style.
hear, hear!
Nikon FM oe Nikon FE would be my choice. Actually, I bought 3 FMs for just under$100 a few yearsago and they all still work!;pretty robust equipment.
The EL is an excellent camera, for me better than the FE. And the FE is a very good camera as well.
I'd rather have another EL than the FA. And I have owned all the cameras mentioned in this post.
I've owned the EL and the EL-2 and they were tools and as good as any Nikon at that time period. For me, the FE2 was a far superior camera when it came to my wedding business. For general Photography it wouldn't mean much as either would work fine. The thing I noticed about both my EL and the EL-2 is that they both seem to love batteries with a passion. You use them a lot in low light and they liked them even more it seemed. Now maybe it was just the two I owned, but I suspect not. Still, they followed the Nikkormat "built like a tank" design.
FA. It is a very underrated body. Nikon promoted it as a professional high tech body and it was. It's not a tank like a F2 or F3 but it has a higher flash synch dual metering, shutter and aperture and program modes and you'll easily find one under $100.
The FA in my opinion is Nikon first failure. They did introduced matrix metering (called AMP at that time) which is one of the few Nikon innovation. However, it represented a problem with the user interface for a camera with 4 exposure modes. Nikon didn't come up with a sastifactory interface until the F5 which is kind of a copy from Canon.
Another vote for the FE. I've used one happily for more than 30 years without trouble. I like the size & weight, exposure hold and DOF preview.
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FG & FE have "classic" center weighted (60/40) metering patterns... not an "average" of the light values across the entire viewfinder. Unless you mean that matrix is superior to center weighted metering
Roland T
Care to elaborate what I highlighted? With references?
Nikon's 60/40 weighted metering pattern is still one of the best ever devised for general photography. It's vastly superior to centerweighted averaging. It even works well with slide film, provided the photographer remains vigilant with regard to the range of light values that fall within the frame.
It's obvious. The Nikon F5 (1996) uses the push-button/dial user interface, particularly "press mode button, rotate dial to change mode". This kind of interface, on a professional camera, appeared first in the Canon EOS 1 of 1989.
Manufacturers are influentied by others, what's the outrage about that?
BTW Nikon, during the 50s to early 80s, was usually a traditional, conservative company, not a highly innovative company. Pentax released a SLR (and SLR lenses) much earlier than Nikon. Pentax also released an electronic AE SLR before Nikon. Everybody "copied" Olympus after the release of the OM-1, the market went to more compact cameras and lenses (IMO, for worse). Nikon "copied" Minolta when making their first fully-featured AF system for the F-501 and F4 cameras.
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Hi Michael McCoolTouch,
What is the difference between 60/40 and centerweighted? I thought 60/40 *was* centerweighed.
Also, what is "centerweighted averaging". I thought only "averaging" meters existed.
So far I understand there are:
- Averaging, like on the Spotmatic cameras
- Centerweighted, like on a lot of 70s cameras including the Nikons; i'd understand 60/40 is just centerweighted as well, having appeared first on the Nikon F Photomic TN (which I owned); perhaps the first camera with centerweighting meter?
- Partial (first machine must be Canon Pellix or FT)
- Spot (various machines)
- Matrix (first by Nikon)
Okay, you're gonna have to permit me to digress for a moment. Back in the days of the Canon AE-1, AE-1P, and A-1, Canon advertized these cameras as having a centerweighted averaging meter. So that's not my choice of words, but theirs. It's my understanding that an averaging meter averages a detected light source across the entire frame. Whereas a centerweighted system places more emphasis on the light values found in the center of a frame. However, strong light values occurring on the edge of a frame can still affect (and often distort) the overall exposure.
Now the difference between 60/40 and a central emphasis type of metering system is the 60/40 system has hard boundaries that are exemplified by the circle seen within a Nikon's viewfinder. 60% of the metering occurs within the circle, 40% without. So with this sort of system, if you have a bright light source that occurs in the 40% area, the maximum effect it can have is 40% of the overall exposure, which is a good thing because it prevents a powerful light source on the perimeter of a photo from overwhelming the meter -- the way it would with an averaging or even a centerweighted averaging system.
If you look at a graphical representation of a central emphasis metering pattern, you will see that it is all gradual from one end of the frame to the other with a peak of emphasis occurring in the center. Me, I like those hard lines because it means I can place a subject more precisely without worrying about a meter shifting its bias the way it might happen with a centerweighted pattern. And believe me when I tell ya, I've had too many experiences with A-series Canons' meters doing precisely such a thing, something I've never had to worry about with Nikon's 60/40 metering pattern.
Hi Cooltouch,
I don't think the metering on those Nikon cameras has any "hard" limits at all. I recall having seen the magazine tests (where they show the graphic of the metering weight versus area) and as far as i recall, they don't have any 'hard' edge at all, they look just like any other centerweighted meter (like the one on the AE-1): looks like a "hump", no extra-hard, delimited boundaries.
The one that almost has hard boundaries is the Nikon F3*. The other that has hard boundaries is the "partial" meter on the FT/FTb/F-1/etc. This because of the design, the little mirror diverts light to the CdS cell and if the light is outside the bounds of the mirror, it simply does not reach the cell.
Where as in the Nikon F Photomic TN, Nikon F Photomic FTN, and Nikon F2 (DP-1), "The Photomics", the pattern is achieved by using simple lenses over the CdS cells, that try to "focus" one of them to the center. This i speak from direct experience, having disassembled those meters. As you will understand, no "hard edges" of delimiting "metering zones" couldn't be possibly implemented with this arrangement.
On an averaging meter, like the one on the Spotmatic, the arrangement of CdS cells is almost identical to the one in The Photomics, with the difference that there is no lenses over the CdS cells. This gives you averaging metering.
* On the F3, the CdS cell is located under the mirror box & behind a complex optical system that truly does focus on the center of the image. Thus the "80/20" pattern which does seem to have the coveted "hard edge".
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