Since the publication of my original book, “Nikon Film Cameras, Which one is right for you?“, I’ve acquired a number of additional cameras and lenses which I describe and evaluate from personal experience in the newly released second edition, which recently went live on Amazon.

In addition to the extra hardware, I tracked the prices of a certain set of Nikon gear as offered by the two largest online retailers of secondhand 35mm equipment in North America from June 2018 to July 2019. As with the first edition, my intention is to inform young people who did now grow up with film photography and are looking to get into a first-class 35mm system on a budget.

The second edition presents detailed price analysis of the FM/FE series of cameras, the mechanical Nikkormats, and the F3, plus lenses including the 24/2.8, 35/2.8, 50/2, 50/1.4, 85/1.8, 85/2, 105/2.5, 135/3.5 and 135/2.8, with unmodified pre-AI and AI-compatible versions analyzed separately.

Those of us who spent most of our lives shooting with film have an obligation to share the benefit of our knowledge and experience with the younger generation. If our collective knowledge is lost, then analog photography will not long survive. This is my humble contribution to that effort.

Below is a section from the book in which I make the case for Nikon while describing some of the more commonly available alternatives. Let’s start with…

Why Nikon?

If you’re looking to get into analog photography for the first time, there are a number of good systems available on the used market you could buy into. Nikon has a few advantages, the first being availability. Since Nikon dominated the professional market for a solid two decades, there is a great deal of used manual-focus Nikon equipment floating around out there and it’s not hard to find. Second is the superb quality of Nikkor lenses. If you buy a prime Nikkor manual-focus lens you are purchasing a piece of optical artwork capable of superior image quality at a fraction of the cost of a comparable new lens.

Third, is lens compatibility. I cover this more extensively in the book but Nikon’s current DSLRs use the same basic lens mount introduced in 1959 on the original Nikon F. Fourth is Nikon’s extensive use of the Copal Square shutter, one of the most well-engineered photographic tools of the twentieth century. The vertically travelling, stainless-steel Copal Square shutter has passed the test of time with flying colors. My local repair tech says he bought a replacement shutter for a Nikon FM thirty years ago just to have in stock for repairs and he’s never needed it. “They just don’t fail,” he said.

There is a wide selection of superior cameras. Enthusiasts of other brands, particularly Pentax, can make the case that their preferred brand’s lenses are as good as, and in some cases better than Nikkor lenses, but none can credibly boast both better lenses and better cameras.

So, if not Nikon then…?

If you wish to make an informed choice you need to know what your other options are. So briefly, here is a reasonably accurate, if highly opinionated review of other 35mm SLR systems you might consider.

Canon…

…was a bit of an also-ran until the introduction of the AE-1 in 1976, an event which marked the beginning of Canon’s dominance of the consumer market for about a decade. There are a great many inexpensive used manual-focus Canon lenses on the market for one simple reason. Unlike Nikon which has kept the original F-mount to this day, Canon completely changed their lens mount in 1987 thus rendering obsolete in a single stroke every lens they had sold up to that point.

My primary criticism of the FL-series and FD-series lenses is that they are larger and heavier than their competitors and the breech-lock lens mount can be tricky in the field. The old joke was that you needed three hands to change a Canon lens, one to grip the camera body, one to grip the lens and a third to rotate the breech locking ring. The New-FD lenses introduced in 1981 switched to a bayonet-style base like everyone else and were smaller and lighter without sacrificing optical quality.

The Canon FTb is one of the finest all-metal, all-mechanical “built like a tank” 35mm SLRs ever made, though it takes mercury batteries, if that’s of concern to you. The Canon A-series is possibly the most successful line of consumer-oriented SLRs in history. The A-1, AE-1 and AE-1 Program are fine cameras. The AT-1, AV-1 and AL-1 are not worth the investment in my opinion. The F-1, in any version, is an excellent camera but very difficult to find in good condition at a reasonable price.

Pentax…

If there is one company which can boast lenses comparable or superior to Nikkors it is Pentax. Originally known as the Asahi Optical Company, their Takumar and SMC lenses are renowned for optical excellence. While Pentax made some of the best lenses in the business, Nikon offered more and better high-end cameras. If you can find an LX in good condition at a good price, buy it and begin collecting K-mount lenses.

Other than the professional system LX your high-end K-mount camera choices are a bit limited, though the KX is a worthy competitor to Nikon’s FM. The attraction of Pentax is the ready availability of inexpensive K-mount lenses which, in addition to being optically unrivalled, are small and light. Indeed, with the introduction of the M-line of compact cameras in 1976 Pentax largely obsoleted Olympus’ main competitive advantage. If you are of the “the camera is just a box, the lens makes the image” school of thought, Pentax may be right for you.

I have just one request. Do not buy a K-1000. The K-1000 is the stripped-down entry-level consumer version of the KM, which itself was merely a Spotmatic converted to K-mount and positioned below the top-tier KX. Back in the 70s the KX was sold at high-end camera stores which catered to professionals. The K-1000 was sold at K-Mart to bargain shoppers and art students. Back then there was a major price difference between these two models. Not today. Spend a little extra time and look for a nice KX.

A word of caution: By the late 70s the K-mount had become the standard for aftermarket manufacturers seeking a slice of the bottom end of the market. Ricoh was a step-down but not a bad second choice; they made extensive use of the Copal Square shutter. I owned an XR-1 which was the best plastic-body second-tier 35mm SLR I’ve ever used. If you’re serious about getting into analog don’t waste your money on the inferior offerings of Cambron, Quantaray, Focal, Albinar, Vivitar or any of the other off-brand distributors. And don’t buy their schlock lenses either.

Disclaimer: In case any of these brands are still in business, let me be clear that I’m referring to products sold over thirty years ago.

Prior to the introduction of the K-mount in 1975 Pentax used the M42 screw mount originally invented in East Germany and popularized by Pentacon’s Praktica line of 35mm SLRs. Incidentally, I believe that Pentacon cameras were the only line of consumer products of any kind produced in Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe (behind the Iron Curtain, as we used to say) and successfully marketed in the capitalist West. If you are looking for oh-so-cool “swirly bokeh” or “bubble bokeh” and other super-groovy optical defects, then this is the system for you. Indeed, the M42 mount, which is also referred to as the universal screw mount, universal thread mount, Pentax screw mount, and Praktica screw mount offers the possibility of two very different classes of lenses in one system. On the one hand you can collect the bokeh-monsters of East Germany (Carl Zeiss Jena, Meyer Optic Goerlitz, Pentacon), the Soviet Union (Helios, Zenit) and the early offerings of Mamiya, Yashica, Rikenon, Fujica and others plus the tack-sharp no-nonsense Pentax Takumars.

The major disadvantage of an M42 system is the need for stop-down metering, assuming you can find a camera with a working light meter. The Pentax Spotmatic is easily the best choice for an M42 body today: all-metal, all-mechanical, superior build quality, plus easy to find on the used market and there are still a few technicians around who know how to fix them. Although the Spotmatic was designed to use mercury batteries its meter employs a bridge circuit which is less sensitive to voltage fluctuations and works well with alkaline replacement batteries without the need for modifications.

Minolta…

…made their name in the 1960s with the SRT-series of 35mm SLRs. There were several models in the series all built on the same chassis with variations in terms of viewfinder information, focusing screens, mirror lock-up, etc. These cameras took mercury batteries and may need to be modified to accept 1.5-volt cells.

If you have access to a technician who fixes them then buy the best SRT you can find and get it overhauled. You now have a tank-like workhorse which will outlive your grandchildren (though the same could be said for the Canon FTb or Pentax Spotmatic).

The camera sold as the XD in Japan, XD-11 in North America and XD-7 in Europe is regarded by many as Minolta’s best auto-exposure, electronic-shutter SLR. It was the first camera from any manufacturer to offer both aperture and shutter-priority automation and the last Minolta SLR with a metal body.

After the XD, Minolta went all-plastic. Of those, the ones to have are the XG-M, X-700 and X-570. Most of the other plastic Minoltas have a major flaw: the light meter does not operate in manual mode. Pair one of the better plastic bodies with the 45mm f/2 pancake lens and you’ve got a very light, compact and capable setup. If you do any portrait or figurative work, get the Rokkor 58mm f/1.4; you will not be disappointed. For detailed information about Minolta manual-focus equipment have a look at a website called, “The Rokkor Files”.

Olympus…

…is unique in that its OM-system is the brainchild of one man, Yoshihisa Maitani, an engineering genius who was passionate about his work. An appreciation of the motivation behind the OM system requires an understanding of a bit of the history of 35mm photography. The original 35mm Leicas of the 1920s and 30s were small and light. A Leica III-series rangefinder with a collapsible Elmar lens could easily fit in a coat pocket. By 1970 SLRs with internal light meters had replaced meterless rangefinders. While this increased the capabilities of the 35mm camera, it did so at the cost of bulk and mass.

The Minolta SRT-101, Canon FTb, Pentax Spotmatic, Konica Autoreflex and the Nikkormat were each about the size and weight of a brick. Mr. Maitani sought to re-engineer the 35mm SLR from the ground up with the goal of creating a light, compact SLR as solid and reliable as the big, bloated competition. He succeeded brilliantly. His OM-1 took the photography world by storm in 1972. Here was a small, light and ergonomically intuitive SLR which sacrificed nothing in terms of functionality and reliability.

The all-mechanical, manual-exposure OM-1 was joined by the electronic, aperture preferred OM-2 in 1975, the first SLR to offer off-the-film-plane metering during flash exposure. These cameras were complemented by the highly regarded Zuiko suite of lenses and accessories. Though Olympus never came close to challenging Nikon’s dominance (neither did anyone else), their equipment was first-rate and constituted quite a serious entry into the professional market. Not too shabby for a company previously best known for its half-frame tourist cameras. My primary criticism of the Olympus OM system is that it offered only one all mechanical, manual exposure SLR, the OM-1.

All other OM-system cameras had electronic shutters and were completely battery dependent. To make matters worse, the OM-1 was designed to use mercury batteries to power the light meter (the OM-2 and subsequent models used 1.5-volt silver oxide batteries) and the viewfinder displayed no information other than a meter needle and index mark. Think of the OM-1 as a miniaturized and ergonomically superior Nikkormat. By the late 70s Olympus’ compact size advantage had diminished. Pentax introduced its M-series and Canon introduced the A-series in 1976. The following year Minolta introduced its XG-series and the massive Nikkormat was replaced by the lighter, compact FM. If you’re the sort of person who values individuality and enjoys being different simply for the sake of being different, but you don’t want to sacrifice quality and reliability, then the Olympus OM-system may be right for you.

Konica…

The last major competitor is Konica, the company which produced the first auto-exposure SLR (the Auto-Reflex with external light meter) and the first auto-exposure SLR with TTL metering, the Autoreflex T. All Konica SLRs offered shutter-preferred auto exposure with full manual control available.

Of all the SLRs produced by Konica, the Autoreflex T3 is the one to have. It offers improvements over its predecessors while retaining all-metal construction. It’s successor, the Autoreflex T4, incorporated plastic body panels and was smaller and lighter. All the plastic-body Konicas suffer one major drawback: the leatherette covering shrinks and peels over time, no matter how carefully the camera has been stored. All Autoreflexes utilize the vertically travelling, stainless-steel Copal Square shutter, require mercury batteries and use CdS metering cells.

The Autoreflexes are unique in that they used a purely mechanical auto-exposure system with no electronics of any kind. The shutter will fire on all speeds without a battery. Konica’s Hexanon lenses are exceptionally sharp and are regularly referred to as “legendary” in photographic literature. I owned a T2 and T3 which had been converted to accept 1.5-volt batteries. These are large, massive cameras. They functioned beautifully, and I never had any problems with them.

Konicas are not nearly as common on the used market today as the other brands reviewed here. If you invest in a Konica SLR system, you’ll likely have the only one in your analog meet-up group. So, if you’re the sort of rugged individualist who likes his cameras big and heavy and you don’t mind putting extra time and effort into hunting for equipment, Konica may be for you.

Final thoughts

Finally, there is one factor which few people talk about but which you may wish to consider in selecting a 35mm system: the availability of repair technicians, or lack thereof. Lenses don’t require much maintenance. Cameras, on the other hand, need to be serviced and maintained.

The number of qualified technicians who know how to fix these old cameras is diminishing rapidly. If there is a good repair technician in your area, find out which are his favorite cameras to work on. Then go out and buy two or three of them and have the tech overhaul them from top to bottom. If you can afford it, this is a very worthwhile investment.

~ Brian

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24 responses to “Choosing a 35mm film SLR? A quick look at six (vintage?) film camera manufacturers…”

  1. Brian,

    Great article!

    A bit of a random question, but do you know the year that the “a Nikon will touch your life” campaign is from? I’m trying to use it in an essay for a course I’m doing on photographic equipment advertising and I’d like to ties it down to a year …. I’m guessing 75 or 76 based on the mention of “Apollo–Soyuz mission” and from the attire.

    Thank you
    Nick

  2. Great article.
    I’ve always swore by the Pentax MX and LX myself. I have two Pentax MX bodies, one in black (which is stunning) and one in the standard black and chrome, and a Pentax LX Titan (a limited edition model). Surprisingly, it’s the MX pair that I enjoy most. These are all robust, bulletproof mechanical gems that just go on, and on. The metering is incredibly accurate and I can’t heap enough praise upon them.

    I still use them as a documentary photographer, to this day. Interestingly, talking of that other manufacturer of compact SLR cameras, Olympus, Don Mcullin was a user of both the OM1 and OM2 at one point in his work as a fellow Docu photographer. However, when considering all mechanical SLR cameras of the Olympus badging, we mustn’t forget the OM3 and OM3ti which are also fully mechanical and absolutely superb.

    Again, great article.

  3. Perhaps it’s not a flaw. and is part of its design, as you say, but the early XGs’ lack of a fully metered manual mode is a shortcoming nevertheless. Cost cutting was tantamount to profits in those days, and Minolta did what they had to do to compete. Minolta did wind up putting metered manual in at the very end of the XG-series, the XG M, but would soon ditch the more durable but slightly pricier tantalum capacitors for cheaper liquid-filled ones that more often than not failed over time. What the Lord giveth, I suppose. I had an SR-T 201 manual match-meter metallic monster in the 70s that I enjoyed and an XG M in the early 80s that despite being plasticky, was a delight to use. They’re long gone, but I now have two other 35mm Minoltas, an XE and XD 11, and am reassured having each of them with reliable working meters in auto and manual modes.

  4. It’s great to see Konica included here. I have to admit to being a avid fan, owning two T3 bodies, as well as the plastic fantastic Cosina made TC-X. Importantly it isn’t covered in the leatherette. It’s proved super reliable so far given the battery is only needed to power the light meter. And the T3s, well they will outlive me.

  5. Why not Nikon? Well, the mount? I sell old cameras and I see a lot of people who want to mess around with old lenses. You can fit anything on to a new Canon or mirrorless but I have to tell people – ‘You bought a Nikon ***D?’ Nothing fits on that. Not even an M42 screw mount. And the F mount itself was always touted as compatible over the decades and from film through to digital but the list of incompatibilities is ten pages long. It’s a crap shoot as to what will fit on what. The Pentax K mount is far more compatible. As to general observations – solid, old, reliable – Nikkormats/Nikomats, Canon FTb, Pentax Spotmatic II and F, Pentax KM, Minolta SRT – they don’t come back. Many later ones are too heavy on electrronics, plastic shells – they fail. I love the exposure system on an Olympus OM-4 for instance, brilliant, but I rarely see one that is still working .

  6. Minor point- you said the Olympus OM-1 was the only fully mechanical SLR model Olympus made, —that all other models had an electronic shutter. Not so. The OM-3 models are all-mechanical, with batteries required only to operate their meter. The OM-3Ti was equipped with the outstanding metering system from the OM-4Ti. It was their most expensive model when released, and used OM-3Ti’s are ungodly expensive today. Plain old OM-3s are more affordable.

    1. You stated in your article on Minolta that there is a fatal flaw. The metering is turned off in manual mode. This is not a flaw, it was designed that way. If you are shooting in manual mode you should be experienced enough to be able to take good images without metering. If you are a novice leave it on automatic and let the metering take over for you if you are unsure what to do.

  7. I still have my first 35mm camera, a Olympus OM-1. Accidentally left it out on the rain one night… next day, dried it off, and it’s worked every since. Hasn’t been used in probably 30 yrs., but I’m seriously considering taking it with me when I turn nomadic next year. My only concern is the price of film.

    1. Kristyanna Virgona Avatar
      Kristyanna Virgona

      My first camera i brought was a Nikon FTn from a pawnshop when i lived in NYC back in 1973. My dad was a photographer in WWII station in Germany where he met my mom, he took shots of Ike, Bradly etc. I had access to Yashica Mat 124 plus a 35mm rangefinder. I’ve been shooting since i was 13. I had also a OM-1, OM-2 & a OM10 i got these after i was working for Digital Equipment Corp as a Sr Field Engineer, i was making better $$$. I got my dads last Yashica 124.

  8. I still have my first 35mm camera, a Olympus OM-1. Accidentally left it out on the rain one night… next day, dried it off, and it’s worked every since. Hasn’t been used in probably 30 yrs., but I’m seriously considering taking it with me when I turn nomadic next year. My only concern is the price of film.

    1. It’s true, the cameras and lenses from the big 5 manufacturers, Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Minolta, Olympus are all good systems in their own right. I own cameras and lenses from all of them apart from Olympus and in my experience, apart from Canon & Nikon the quality of the cameras is pretty much on an equal par. That said the pentax LX and the Minolta SRT series are every bit as good as a Nikon FM or Canon FTB. As far as lenses go, I honestly believe that minolta MD & Canon FD lenses are absolutely the equal of anything from Nikon or Pentax. That may just be my opinion and if you disagree, that’s fine but I think it’s both unfair and inaccurate to say that Nikon & Pentax optics are superior to Canon and Minolta optics, or Olympus for that matter. In spite of this, any of these systems would be a superb choice for anyone getting into 35mm at the moment. Also, while I appreciate the Spotmatic range of cameras are an excellent choice for M42 lenses, don’t discount the Chinon CS or CX , M42 cameras which again are very well made and also extremely reliable and are very cheap on the used market. They may not have the kudos of a pentax spotmatic but they are a great quality alternative and are far less expensive.

  9. Eric J Woodbury Avatar

    I have used cameras by all these companies except Nikon, although not all these models. Agree that Nikon is rugged. My Canon FT was a tank. Pentax are nice for basics and lots of lenses. Easy to fix. I had an auto Minolta that worked exceptional well for all auto. Olympus’ size was a wonderful change, but the lens iris blades were a bad design and wore prematurely. Also used Leica, both Cs and M3. Awkward. (and not SLR). Now days I use Contax SLR and rangefinder for 35mm. Best optics by far. No question Zeiss lenses are tops.

    It’s fun to see the old ads. How things have changed. Sure didn’t think it would go this way.

  10. Pretty sure you can meter minolta x-700 in manual mode. Certainly you can with an x300

  11. Great article. Congrats!

    Here an insider: The Canon EF. Almost as good as a F-1, but much cheaper.

  12. Canon TOP, built like a tank and called The Tank!
    Best manual focus film SLR ever made in my opinion.

  13. Canon TOP, built like a tank and called The Tank!
    Best manual focus film SLR ever made in my opinion.

  14. While I mostly use Nikons for my film work, I do have a sizable collection of screw mount Pentax Taks. With cheap, and simple, m42 to Canon FD adapters, they mount easily (and yes, focus to infinity) on my Canon T90. The T90 meters excellently with these lenses in stop down mode. It’s the best of both worlds: exquisite, small, Pentax Takumars with the T90’s excellent metering.

  15. I enjoyed your article and the trip back through early SLR history but I’m afraid you’re wrong where you stated “All other OM-system cameras had electronic shutters and were completely battery dependent. ” The OM3 was also a fully machinical shutter camera. While it had the same metering system as the OM4, the camera shutter worked at all speeds independent of battery power. So just like the OM1, the meter required a battery but the camera shutter did not.

  16. I have a minolta x300 and the meter does work in manual mode. The x500and x700 would be no different. Great cameras, though XD better

  17. Kenneth E. Rosen Avatar
    Kenneth E. Rosen

    Excellent article. However, the OM-1 was not the only Olympus with manual only exposure and a mechanical shutter. The OM-3 and OM-3ti had those features, plus multi-spot metering. They are pretty expensive, though.

  18. Kenneth E. Rosen Avatar
    Kenneth E. Rosen

    Excellent article. However, the OM-1 was not the only Olympus with manual only exposure and a mechanical shutter. The OM-3 and OM-3ti had those features, plus multi-spot metering. They are pretty expensive, though.

  19. I have or have had some of these cameras and this is a good write up. Some of the Canon EOS stuff is… https://t.co/qo6mR0SAgR

  20. Interesting even Cosina made a lovely K mount SLR

  21. Awesome write-up Brian! Konica is definitely the dark horse of the bunch, but I’ve taken some of my best pictures with my T3n and the Hexanon 50mm f1.4. Awesome camera and the most reliable of all of Konica’s cameras.

    Greg Weber has an awesome table of Konica models with reliability ratings on his website. http://webercamera.com/. He also does Konica repairs and has spare parts.

    I think people make way too much of the mercury battery issue. I (and many others) have used 675 hearing aid batteries with great success in cameras that used the old mercurys. What they lack in endurance, they make up for by being cheap. They also have almost the exact same power curve as silver oxide batteries, meaning they hold constant voltage better than alkalines.

    I stress this because you’ve got some great cameras on this list and no one should let the mercury battery issue hold them back from buying them.

 

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