Nikon F3 owners, speak up!

cgw · Oct 15, 2018

You first, show me I'm wrong. Friends at Henry's and Vistek in Toronto in the early '00s sold very few relative Nikon's other offerings. They viewed it as a white elephant--as did customers who might have bought 5-6 years earlier. FM3as quickly became a special order item. Nikon.ca in Mississauga was selling off store demos in 2002-03. I bought a discounted "demo" 45/2.8Ai-P then with a warranty card that looked new. A nice camera but it appears Nikon goofed by over-estimating demand for MF bodies relative to AF and then digital in 2004-5 with the D70 and D200. Only recounting what I saw where I stood. YMMV, as usual.

bhop · Oct 15, 2018

Derrel said:
The F6 sold so poorly that I have never even SEEN one in real life, either on the street, or at my favorite camera shop, where all types of new and used cameras turn up.

Me neither. I was thinking of getting one now that used prices are starting to dip under $1k. Everything i've read about it says it's the best AF Film SLR ever made... even though, honestly speaking, it probably doesn't do anything "for me" than my current crop of cameras do. It's just expensive GAS..

On the other hand, the people who tout the "reliability" of the F and F2 seem to want to ignore the fact that a HUGE number of the light meters in the interchangeable prisms of those two cameras were dead after a mere five to 10 years of use; even back in the mid-1980's, mid- to late-19709's Photomic prisms often had a dead light meter. So much for "reliability".

I think they're usually talking about the mechanical aspects, (fears about the electronic shutter in the f3) but the meter is a good point too.. My f2 meter works, but you have to wiggle the knob so much that it's really unusable. The last time I shot with it, I just left the batteries out and external metered.

compur · Oct 15, 2018

cgw said:
You first, show me I'm wrong.

See Nikon model production period chart on this page:
Nikon F3 - Wikipedia

FM3A was produced for 5 years. Compare this period with other models in the chart such as the ones I mentioned above.

So your opinion is based on what 2 dealers in Canada said? Maybe it bombed in Canada but it's a big world and products sell differently in different countries. Canadians probably can't focus an MF lens very well with their mittens on.

(joke)