Nikonos V

Nikonos V as Rugged Travel Camera – a Retrospective By Simon Foale

By / August 1, 2022 / Underwater/Rugged Cameras / 18 Comments

I first encountered the legendary Nikonos cameras in January 1983, when, as a freshly qualified SCUBA diver I spent a couple of weeks diving with family friend Rob Van der Loos, who was living in Alotau, Milne Bay, Papua New Guinea. Rob had a Nikonos II and Nikonos III at the time and was doing a lot of macro photography in soft sediment habitats close to Alotau town at night, using underwater flashes, and extension tubes for the 35mm F2.5 lens. I was completing a degree in marine science at the time so tried to use some of my rudimentary learnings to help him classify some of the staggering diversity of spectacular critters he was photographing. The slides produced by the Nikonos cameras were mesmerizingly beautiful. Decades later ‘muck diving’ became a thing. We also did a lot of reef dives and I can confirm that Milne Bay is a diving mecca for good reason.

Nikonos V camera and Nikonos 15mm

Nikonos 15mm f/2.8 Lens Mini Review – Shooting Fuji Velvia & Provia 100 – by Simon Foale

By / October 29, 2022 / Lenses / 11 Comments

I’ve noticed some interest in the Nikonos cameras on 35mmc and Emulsive so, having used this system a fair bit in the pre-digital era, I thought it might be worth sharing some notes on, and images from, the amazing Nikonos 15mm F2.8 lens. Getting good wide-angle images with a land camera (digital or film) in an underwater housing has always been enough of a pain that I am regularly reminded of the superiority of the Nikonos system for wide-angle photography underwater.

Nikonos V

5 Frames in the Ocean with a Nikonos V on Kodak Portra 400 – By Luis Ortega

By / October 1, 2020 / 5 frames with... / 24 Comments

Having recently found a gem of a deal for a Nikonos V in a stellar condition I’ve been using it on swims every weekend. Living in San Diego I normally shoot surf photography. Problem was, this has been as flat a summer as I can remember.

Fortunately, the beginning of fall came with a fresh swell. I put a new roll of Portra 400 in the camera and hopped in the water.

Street shootout between Nikon 35mm camera/lens combos yields surprising results – By Isaac D. Pacheco

By / May 20, 2020 / Gear Theory / 9 Comments

Gear reviews are typically created to help consumers decide between products with similar specifications and price points. Accordingly, comparisons often focus on the nuances that exist between otherwise analogous products. That was obviously not the intent of this zany Nikon 35mm shoot off. This review grew from my desire to see how my recently acquired Nikonos V with its included W-Nikkor 35mm f/2.5 lens, which I picked up second hand for $200, stacked up against Nikon’s top-of-the-line 35mm film combo, the $2,500 Nikon F6 and $1,500 AF-S Nikkor 35mm f/1.4G.

Nikonos V

Nikonos V Review – Cycling with and shooting on Dry Land – Steven Bleistein

By / May 15, 2020 / Underwater/Rugged Cameras / 17 Comments

If nothing else, Japan where I make my home, is wet. The rainy season lasts from mid-June to the end of July, typhoons regularly lash the archipelago from August to October, and then there are just the banal rainy days. These in themselves were enough to make me long for a waterproof film camera for street photography, and one that has a lot of manual control rather than a disposable one or some of the old waterproof point-and-shoots. So I had always been intrigued by the Nikonos cameras. 

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