Nikon History: WAR tools, CRUSHING Leica & Canon... and then... (Picture This Podcast)

Nikon should go back to 35mm film where it all started. I am sure with the technology that is around in 2020 they could improve on like the Nikon F6.
I am old school and I do prefer the film camera over digital and was brought up on film.

I started on 110 film then went to 35mm and then to digital and in the last couple of years switched back to film. I currently own a Nikon D300 that I purchased new back in 2009 (over a D90), a Nikon F80 and a Nikon F60D Panorama and I am looking at picking up the Nikon F5 which will be my go to camera.
I only want a camera to shoot photos not videos, so if I want a video I will use my iPhone 11Pro Max.

Great série Thx for it. Did you publish something for zeiss ? I looked for it but can t find...

Too much unsatisfactory and wrong statements in this video. The Nikon EM wasn't Nikon answer to Canon AE-1. Nikon banked on pros and semi-pros and releases the FM in 1977 and short after the FE. The Nikkormat EL with electronic priority was released in 1972, 4 years before the Canon AE-1 and Nikon answered the AE-1 with the 1977 EL-2, too. Nikons target were semi-pros and professionals. Canon changed the game and targeted the AE-1 on hobbbiests. Canon settled on the mass market of hobbiests and in my opinion there was never a competion between AE-1, FM or EL2. Canon's AE-1 kicked out Yashica, Pentaxand other. Not Nikon. Nikon neglected the consumer market until the EM came out and that was in 1979, three years after the Canon AE-1 was released, therefore it was never an answer to the AE-1 but the 1979 EM a sign, that Nikon was sleeping very well.

I was a pro who switched from Nikon to Canon in 2006. Couldn't stand the crop sensor.

You two really forgot two of my favorite Nikons, the FM2 and FA.

Only thing that will happen is cameras for consumers will disappear (nikon shutting D3500 and D5600), and will remain only pro grade equipment manufacturers. Nikon's mirrorless cameras arent cheap.

I think it is not where you came from, but where the company comes from and intended it to be called.. ニコン　and not ナイコン. You are pronouncing the latter.

Mind you have some respect, Nikon is from Japan, you dun call it your way depend on where u from

"depending on where you're from" lol

Knee-con please

2021, the irony is nothing has changed the Japanese still rely on foreigners for innovation, and obsfucate it...
I blame the educational system and corporate culture.

The irony is that Japan is quiet opposite of the stereotype.
Extremely inefficient and the anti collaborative culture hinders growth and innovation.

Officially, the pronunciation is Knee/cone.

Loved my D1h and my D3s stunning cameras 📷❤️

What I find really interesting is.....that the creation of the camera was really made for professionals in my opinion...but in the middle time frame these companies...nikon, canon, Pentax decided to start making cameras for consumers as well, but now with the introduction of smart phones...it appears that canon, Nikon are more focusing on the professional market(going back to its roots)

Little bit of difference in opinion, I had a Nikon Ftn purchased in 1975 followed by two FM bodies with winders in 1976. The FM ran circles around the Canon AE1 imho. I was a a photo journalist and University yearbook photog and the FMs got me through 4 years of photography school. My degree was a BS in Photography, 1980, and we then switched to the F2 and then F3 when using company owned bodies in the early 80s.

Thanks so much for this informative history of Nikon! Keep it up! Thanks!

A fairly interesting video but some Very important models were omitted. Not mentioned were the FM/FM2, FE/FE2, and the FA (with advanced multi-pattern metering) Also the F801/F801S which, along with the F4 convinced many pros to take autofocus seriously.

this entire episode frames this war between Canon and Nikon and never ONCE brings up that at one point, Pentax was bigger than both of them COMBINED.

You say Tomaato we say Tomaeto
Niekon neekon, let's call the whole thing off...

A huge part of Nikons success was because it vowed to keep every lens compatible with every body. Back in the day, newspapers/magazines only used in house photographers and supplied their gear. They gave each photographer a basic kit, but kept spares on hand. They would also maintain huge lens 'banks' where multiple copies of every lens was available to their photographers. If a camera company changed mounts, - Pentax and Canon both did - it could cost a newspaper/magazine many thousands of dollars.
Nikon also maintained fully mechanical cameras like the FM and FM2, which were cheap and popular backups for F users, they also had faster flash synch and top shutter speeds. Having cornered the market, they led in innovation - the F3 was available with the first way of transmitting digital pictures with a special back and modem set up, you could hold your brick phone up to it and transmit pictures by phone.

As for film size, the original 35mm cameras weren’t designed or made to be cameras. They were designed as a device to do test strips on batches of 35mm film stock. In the days of film, emulsions varied and each batch needed to be tested for accuracy. - you actually used to be able to buy old movie stock film, since movie makers had to buy enough to shoot a whole film on the same film batch and have spare for emergencies. I think a couple of companies that used to give 'free' film in return for every roll processed by mail order used to use old movie stock.
If you look in old National Geographics, it’s not rare to see somebody wearing a red NG raincoat. These were made to precise specifications and given to every NG photographer. Photographers were required to take a couple of shots of these jackets at the start of the film batch they took with them, in extreme conditions possibly on every roll. NG would then cut test strips with those first few frames and by colour matching, determine processing. They only accepted Kodachrome, so there was no correcting in the printing. I believe they made some exceptions when Fuji released Velvia. But NG looks the way it does, because it’s all Kodachrome

My first camera was the AE1 in 1977.

USA Americans cant prounounce Nikon its not NYECON

These two a quite inept.

Wow that was a fun history lesson! Learned so much!!!

Hi Tony and Chealsy nice review very well documented as all the remarquable serie on the big brands of photography and thanks a lot for that. One point I don’t agree is when you say to fight with Canon on the non professional market they deliver the Nikon EM. That s not true. They already get a line for non pro which was the Nikkormat since the sixties but it was big built like a tank and not sexy at all just like Canon got his big FT, FTb and EF (which is internally very similar to the AE1). What changed the game is Olympus (and Pentax just after) who produced the compact OM1. Then all the non pro market wanted these small but as efficient as the big ones but nicer and lighter. The answer to this for Canon was the A serie starting with the AE1 and Nikon with thé FM and FE serie. The EM (which was for me not a good camera) appears long time after and to address another part of users with a full automatic mode less build quality and cheaper optics. The genius of Canon was to produce a speed priority automatic camera which is for me (as a photographer) not the best one but the easiest one to understand for beginners. It s easy to understand that if a subject is moving fast you need to take a photo with a high shutter speed, it s less easy to understand that for isolating the subject from the background or to take a quick shutter speed you need to use a opened dia and for me that s why Canon sold a lot of AE1 which is a good camera but not a good tool to learn photography as no aperture priority and an a not really usable dOF lever (you need to put the aperture manually at the same value than the one indicated in the viewfinder … which is crazy and doesn’t t work in speed priority mode as aperture is mechanically set to minimum value). This is just the point I wanted to correct.

When talking about the pro segment and the competition between Nikon and Canon, the F1 ist missing

Thank you. Very interesting, but one omission (in my opinion): the Canon T90. It changed everything in terms of design and ergonomics, AND it was more versatile and more fun to use than anything that came before it. Also, it was so well made that mine works as good as the day I bought it. For my money, it was the best slr ever made. It could also be on display in an art museum. A thing of sheer beauty.

Nikon bought the design of the Nikonos from Jacques Cousteau.

When are you going, please, to subtitle in french, or german? .... The Japanese say Nikon, not Naikon!

i remember the day my dad gave me his old nikon f photomic and f3 and s2 in 2001 and i started to do photograpy
when i got them i loved watching my film being produced and the smell of the chemicals
now days i use the nikon d5 and i love it many pepole ask me why i use nikon and not canon and they allways tell me nikons a dead brand but to me it will never die and ill always use nikon

Hiiii Chelsea ♥️♥️♥️♥️😍😍 and camera assistant.

Chells, how long have you been giving Timothy lessons he seems to learning a lot. Keep up the good work, chells, and boom operator.

Chells, did I tell how dreamy you look today in that blue blouse? Take that Terrence.

Canon and Nikon work together with release dates in order not to step on each other foot. Amateur digital camera today are the cameras we dreamed about in the 70s. It's like apple vs Mac. Get it

Nikon f a brick , plus x , f8 and be there.

This comment is six years late, but I notice that the early 24x32 film size is very close to a 4x5 aspect ratio. The Kodak 24x36 standard is a 4x6 aspect ratio.

Konica also produced a fabulous SLR in the 1960s (with an excellent f1.4 lens.)

Also worth noting is the outstanding Nikkormat, a bulletproof SLR widely used by journalists and enthusiasts.

Excellent vids peeps, Nikon rocks. Proud owner of a D800

The girl is bias to canon and leica. Kick em.

It's funny that the AE-1 was a "cheap" and "plastic" model, I bought one for cheap on a whim about 15-20 years ago and also had a modern canon film dslr. The difference in build quality and overall feel were ridiculous, I basically never used the EOS 3000 again after I bought the AE-1.

I'm surprised you didn't mention the Nikomat/Nikkormat-bodies when talking about competing with canon for the consumer market.

I would like to see a video about what else these companies make. Not in great detail, but Nikon, Canon, Leica, and Zeiss all have technical divisions making products unrelated to photography. Also, some camera companies are owned by larger holding companies or are affiliated with other companies who could decide the fate of camera production. Ricoh is an example of a company that makes cameras, but their camera division is dwarfed by their production of office equipment, for example.

Obsessive craftsmanship, Leica 🔁 Nikon ❤

"...they will be around...". As you so aptly bring up, they won't be around without some kind of major pivot. Many legacy companies have been flattened by disruption.

I'm watching this in 2024, as I hold my 3 month on z6iii. This was a cool video for history, but your predictions about the direction of the business may go. Looking back, what do you guys think of how things have gone over these last 8 years? You'll probably never even see this. lol. CamRodTravels

Brian Staveley - you should check him out. How can you presume to know what GOD would or would not do? If you explore Dose Of Reality, you will find yourself in new rabbit holes, perhaps.

Brian would be a great guest on your channel - you and him would definitely vibe.