I’ll be honest my bias leans heavily toward simple, understated mechanical cameras. Features mean absolutely nothing without usability, and it was time to see if the F6 could impress beyond its extensive spec sheet. And in a way, focusing on its long list of capabilities is missing the point. Think, the most capable film camera ever made.Īnd after ten minutes of fiddling with the camera’s various controls it became exceedingly apparent that attempting to reach the limit of the F6’s capabilities would be a fool’s errand.
#Canon 1v vs nikon f6 full#
The F6’s spec sheet promises everything any shooter could want, including a 1/8000th of a second maximum shutter speed, a 1/250th of a second flash sync speed, Nikon’s incredible color matrix metering along with spot and classic center-weighted metering, full PASM mode selection, i-TTL wireless flash metering, 100% viewfinder coverage, built-in 5.5 FPS motor drive (8 FPS with the added MB-40 battery pack), 41 slots of custom settings, compatibility with all Nikon AF lenses including full VR capability, backwards compatibility with every Nikon AI lens (extendable to non-AI with a factory modification from Nikon), CF card data storage, AF tracking, and a thousand more functions that’ll somehow justify this ridiculous run-on sentence. And against all odds, a stray F6 decided to exist in my possession – even if only for a little while.īeing the camera geek I am, I immediately set out to explore any and all features of this remarkable machine. One gets the distinct feeling they’re holding something that shouldn’t logically exist, but does anyway. Thinking of the F6 in this light, as an anomaly in the timeline of photography, makes picking up and using one even more special. By that time, film had abdicated the throne for good. This would have been normal in the past, of course, but at the time of its introduction in 2004 digital photography’s reign was firmly established. It’s a brand new, professional-grade, state-of-the-art camera made for… film.
So in a sense, the F6 is the final expression of 35mm camera technology, and by extension, the last holdout to make a case for 35mm film as a viable medium for real photographers.īut even though the F6 is among the most important cameras ever made, it’s also among the most peculiar.
#Canon 1v vs nikon f6 professional#
But what’s even more remarkable is that the F6 remains the very last professional 35mm SLR still in production in today’s age of DSLRs and mirror-less marvels (its competitors threw in the towel shortly after its introduction). This range of cameras has been the standard bearer in professional-grade SLR cameras for the latter half of the twentieth century. The Nikon F6 is the last in a long, storied line of Nikon’s professional F-series of SLRs. But there it was, right in front of me, waiting patiently for its first roll of film.īut before I get to deep into this write-up, and to quell the chorus of readers who are certainly rolling there eyes at my excessively reverential tone, let me explain the reason for my shock and awe. I couldn’t believe I was getting the chance to shoot Nikon’s final professional film camera, the swan song of the analog era, and possibly the greatest film SLR ever made, the Nikon F6. Nothing really prepares a person for the truly extraordinary moments in life, and this moment was no exception. I took off the top cover and, somehow, I knew immediately.
I carefully pried open the box, and after sifting through a few bits of paper packaging, the cardboard mold of the F6 revealed itself. It was gold, and emblazoned with words I thought I’d never see in the flesh – Nikon F6.
What greeted me from inside this innocuous box was another, prettier box. When I saw that its origin was CP founder James, I immediately carried it into the house, grabbed some scissors, and sliced through the packaging. Its presence was a little strange, as I hadn’t ordered anything, but I was mostly sure it wasn’t a bomb. It was just a few weeks ago that I discovered a benign looking package sitting on my front porch. I shifted between grief and remembrance, and wandered around the house aimlessly as the memory of a truly great camera still lingered in my brain. The rest of the day was spent in a silent stupor – the muted shock which occurs when someone or something truly special is taken from us. I drove home, the familiar presence of a bulky, black camera sadly absent from my passenger’s seat. I headed to the post office and reverently handed the package to a clerk, who unceremoniously stuffed it into a shopping cart and distractedly ordered me to have a nice day. I shut the gold box for the last time and laid it into a bigger, blander box, a Priority Mail shipping label from Los Angeles to Boston its only decoration.
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