Yes. Not just focusing. Lens mounting is also backwards. It's not just Canon shooters who think so, all other cameras I own do this properly (Canon, Leica, Mamiya, Fuji, and Hasselblad). IIRC the only other goofy brand is Bronica.
It's not just about lenses. Generally when you're turning something clockwise, you're screwing it in (or getting closer to something).
Focusing doesn't bother me much, but changing lenses does, for some reason...
At least the FD "L" lenses are finally getting wide appreciation now as sought-after adapted glass for mirrorless digital bodies: you can't pick them up cheap anymore.
Speaking of Nikkormats, apparently that was also the choice of British photographer Raymond Moore. You can see him shooting with it at about the 5:11 mark in this video:My remarks about the Nikon F2 halo effect were meant to be specifically referring to the OP question of why the Canon F-1 didn't become as popular as it should have: my point was Nikon had a lock on the market of amateurs who could afford a $450 SLR that Canon was unable to lure away in any significant numbers. The Canon sold well to pros but didn't reach critical mass with well-heeled amateurs. Of the 880,000 F2 cameras Nikon sold, at least half went to non-pros who perpetuated a mystique, and those F2s flood the used marketplace to this day. The Canon F-1 didn't have that volume of sales and never developed iconic status among amateurs: it remained a well-respected professional tool with little mass market recognition.
I agree with your points about the popularity or advantages of Olympus OM-1, Minolta SRT and Pentax Spotmatic over the Nikkormat: of course these were the bread and butter of camera stores, outselling the pro Canons and Nikons by an order of magnitude. The OM-1 was probably the most well-conceived, jewel like cameras of the '70s: I begged my father to buy me one for my 16th birthday and was shocked that he agreed to let me pay off the $240 cost bit by bit. Wonderful camera, totally lived up to its rep as the "Leica M3 of SLRs". But it didn't begin picking off Nikkormat sales in earnest until 1974-1975, by which time it was eating heavily into SRT and Spotmatic - KM - KX sales as well.
That period came a couple years after the introduction of the Canon F-1 and the peak of the Nikkormat, which is the era I was speaking of (1970-1973) when I said the F/F2 had massive name recognition and Nikkormat dominated college campuses. Canon faced immense headwinds introducing the all-new F-1 and FD system into that environment: the Nikon F was still top of the heap, the F2 was the new glamour magnet, and Nikon/EPOI savagely undercut other mfrs by offering steep discounts on Nikkormats to students (lowering the cost to below a Spotmatic or SRT). The Nikkormat may have been a clunky dog vs SRT or Spotmatic, but Nikon snared the college kids early then had them for a lifetime.
It took Olympus to break that logjam and shake up the industry (including students), but the OM-1 tornado didn't hit full force until '74. Between its failure to siphon off the wealthy amateur market from Nikon with the F-1, and shock at the success of Olympus OM, Canon regrouped and bet all its chips on the AE-1 stealth bomb for 1976. The AE-1 took the market by storm based on price and sexy automation, but the pro F-1 stubbornly remained a non-starter in the rich mans toy segment still owned by Nikon with the F2S. At least Canon had ensured Nikon would never again get a restful nights sleep in the volume mid-price segment: the once-lucrative Nikkormat was getting killed on one end by the tiny lightweight Olympus OM-1, and the other by the sexy electronic whiz-bang AE-1. The FM helped a little against the OM-1 but Nikon took way too long to introduce its automatic sister the FE (which Canon then blunted with its super computerized A-1 step-up from AE-1). Finally, we had a real streetfight between titans.
I forgot..........i have a speed-finder for my F-1 New. I just slipped it on.
I do not have a lot of experience with these, and Zero experience with speeders for Minolta, Nikon, Etc etc
But the Canon seems to be Very Nice. Not sure how often I WILL use it, but i am happy to have it.
It really is in the eye of the beholder then, I honestly find all the manufacturers sharp enough. All those optics sharpen up considerably by 1.4 anyway. Nice to have options.To answer the question asked in the title of this thread: when I decided to get back to film, I just couldn't make myself to look at Canon again.
In the digital/auto-focus world I was completely unimpressed with their glass (I mostly used L-lenses). Canon's EF lenses were usually a bad deal in terms of speed/bulk/price/wide-open-performace. Their f/1.2 series should have been f/1.4. Their f/1.8 lenses should have been f/2, and so on. Most lenses come with the weight & price tax for an unusable maximum aperture. I snapped out of this vicious cycle only when I discovered Fuji digital cameras.
So when switching to film, I just assumed that FD lenses are similar and didn't even look at Canon. It doesn't matter now because my AI-S Nikkors, Leica M-lenses, and Voigtlanders are all light & small and perfectly usable at their maximum apertures.
Good Grief.............. i forgot it swivels like that.I think a nice big eye cup for it would really make it perfect, but even still it's a pleasure to use. In fact I was out shooting macro today and was working in a lot of setups that would have been back-breakers without the speed finder.
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I would say "Heavy" is relative to other cameras that fulfill a similar need. It probably is as heavy if not heavier than most 35mm SLR.The word in my area (UK) in the early seventies was that Canon's were big, heavy and the breech lock mount meant that lens changes were slow and clumsy. I can't say personally if any of that was true, as I was using 42mm screw thread lenses at the time, so speed wasn't a thing I knew anything about! No doubt I was also over-influenced by my elder brother who was an evangelist for the OM-1.
It's probably hard for anyone today to appreciate just how much we lusted over the gorgeous adverts in the photo mags (Practical Photography and Amateur Photography for me). Those huge lenses with the richly-coloured coatings! No doubt they wouldn't have seemed so luscious if we had known how to talk to girls...
To me it means " some people know the price of everything, and the value of nothing".I admit that I find it sort of strange that a basic Canon F-1 outfit and a Nikon Fx can be had for less money today than a Yashica T4 Super, but I guess that's cultural shifts for you.
What about the F mount makes it more special than the FD mount? Compatibility with a wider array of lenses?
Speaking of Nikkormats, apparently that was also the choice of British photographer Raymond Moore. You can see him shooting with it at about the 5:11 mark in this video:
In that era when I was a student doing photography at college in Sheffield, and Ray Moore was lecturing 40 miles away at a similar course in Derby, Nikkormat's weren't just popular because the college stores had them for students to use, but because they were tough as nails and a genuine backup camera to the F or F2.
Not too many have it because it wasn't as popular as the F or F2 or F3. Only after the F4 was introduced did Canon started to catch up and surpass Nikon. But today since there are relatively few of them I think the people who have them would love them more than people with the Nikon's love their. They are also carrying higher price tag than Nikon's today.
The AE-1 took the market by storm based on price and sexy automation, but the pro F-1 stubbornly remained a non-starter in the rich mans toy segment still owned by Nikon with the F2S. At least Canon had ensured Nikon would never again get a restful nights sleep in the volume mid-price segment: the once-lucrative Nikkormat was getting killed on one end by the tiny lightweight Olympus OM-1, and the other by the sexy electronic whiz-bang AE-1. The FM helped a little against the OM-1 but Nikon took way too long to introduce its automatic sister the FE (which Canon then blunted with its super computerized A-1 step-up from AE-1). Finally, we had a real streetfight between titans.
It was about the time the F4 was introduced which was an AF camera that didn't.It was the introduction of EF mount lenses for autofocus EOS SLRs that was the turning point for Canon, along with Canon factory support and loaner lenses for Olympics etc. with all the white long FL lenses for the photojounalists to use.
The encyclopedic knowledge possessed by some of you guys is impressive. I've learned a ton from reading this thread, thanks.
It was about the time the F4 was introduced which was an AF camera that didn't.
Nikkormat FT2 came to be seen as clunky, old fashioned and overpriced: Other than their CdS meters going half or fully dead (a common plague among all '70s SLRs), nothing ever goes wrong with Nikkormats: the film advance, Copal Square shutter, and body build are bulletprooof. Prices on fast aperture common focal lengths are significantly lower on some of the Nikkor classic optics vs other brands (partly because theres twice to thrice as many Nikkor lenses available, partly because '70s/'80s Nikkors have lost a bit of their cache and are considered "flat and boring" nowadays vs the exotic, harder to find Takumars, Rokkors, Hexars and Canon FDs).
I have owned and used nearly all of the legendary primes thru the years but have always found that I favored the true-to-life rendition of the Nikkors.
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