Photography with Warren's Nikon F2

I finally took the Nikon F2 that Warren generously gave me a few years ago out for a shoot. Here are some images from a roll of Kodak Gold 200 taken in Annapolis last Saturday afternoon. I took the roll to Costco (Price Club) and they developed and scanned the negatives for me (the scanning resolution works out to 19 megapixels!)

I used a Nikkor 43-86mm f/3.5 zoom, a classic lens, the first version of which is reputed by some to be the worst lens Nikon ever made. This one is the 11-element 1976 AI version. I rather liked its performance, which was limited anyway by my presbyopic ability to focus properly without a prescription eyepiece.

I made some very slight adjustments for exposure and color temperature in Adobe Camera Raw, then added a very little bit of sharpening in Photoshop to get these end results. I'm very happy with the colors, but the grain of the film is very apparent, even at less than 50% magnification in Photoshop (hard to see in these 800-pixel, web-sized images.) I attribute that to the film itself, and will try Kodak Ektar 100 or Portra 160, both of which are said to be much better in terms of grain and suitability for scanning.

In any event, I am enjoying displaying and using these classic cameras. With my recent attack of Gear Acquisition Syndrome (GAS,) I've already acquired far too many classic SLRs in the past month or so, but at least they'll keep Warren's two Nikons company. I'll be shooting most of them over the next few weeks and months and will report back on them as well.

Thanks again Warren!

More Nikon FM Photos...

Just after I took a few snaps of the gentleman, this beautiful young woman stepped in to pose in front of the vintage bike. I think she looks like a young Joan Collins... maybe even more lovely.

The other photo is an abstract of shadows of the cast iron railing on the steps of a brownstone on W. 15th Street. The brownstone was indeed brown, and I gave it the sepia treatment.

These were taken with the Nikon FM that Warren generously gave me!

Vintage Model, Vintage Film Nikon

I kibbitzed my way into getting a few shots of this photo session last Saturday in Central Park, NYC.

Now this is pretty special, because it was taken on actual film with one of the actual classic Nikon SLRs that Warren generously sent to me a couple of years ago. This was a long time coming, because I promised Warren that I would use these beauties, but this is the first time I took one out for a spin... my apologies, Warren... and I'll try to make up for it in the next few weeks by shooting more with them!

For the record, I took the handsome black Nikon FM with me, mounting a 50mm f/1.8 Nikon Series E lens that belongs to a Nikon EM I bought in 1983. My film was Kodak Gold 200 (less than six bucks for 3 rolls at Target!) I took the roll to Costco tonight and had them develop the negatives and scan them. For about four bucks and change, I got the processing and a CD with 5444 x 3658 .jpg scans of the 24 negatives. Now, if my math is correct, 5444 x 3658 pixels comes out to about 19.9 megapixels - not bad!

I'll spend some more time with Photoshop CS5 to see if I can squeeze more performance out of these scans, but meanwhile, this image is "processed" in Picassa version 3, the free photo editor from Google. The scans all seemed a little overexposed, so I used the shadow slider in Picassa to darken a bit, corrected a little blue cast, and then converted this image to sepia, which seems to me to fit the subject.

I wanted to take the Nikon F2 Warren has also sent me, but at the last minute, I realized I never got split-rings for it so I could attach a proper camera strap (the snap-swivels on the straps won't fit through the strap lugs on the F2 body)... and I wasn't able to get the triangular split rings off of the FM or any of the other SLRs I now have. I'll take a trip to my local Ace Hardware this weekend and get several sets, one of which I'll attach the the F2's strap lugs.

Warren, thanks again for these wonderful cameras - I'll be finally putting them to good use over the next few weekends. In particular, I'll take them into Annapolis and shoot some scenes that I've already done digitally, so I can do some comparisons. I have a 43-86mm Zoom Nikkor that I snagged for a good price on eBay that's going on the F2 - I think it will looks especially cool with that classic lens (it's the newer, 11-element version.)

I have several more photos to post from my NYC trip, taken with the FM, that will follow this one.