Nikon Has Forgotten the Photographer

I love Nikon cameras. I've been using them since I bought a secondhand EL2 in 1984. I've owned more Nikon cameras than I care to remember, and just last month, I acquired an F from 1972. So this isn't an anti-Nikon article, nor am I arguing that Nikon makes bad cameras. Quite the opposite. I’m a bit of a fanboy, if I’m completely honest.

Nikon makes some of the best cameras in the world. But there’s something that has been bothering me for a while: I think Nikon has forgotten about the photographer.

The company has become very good at making cameras that do everything. Photography, video, vlogging, streaming, and content creation are increasingly packed into the same body. I understand why. The market has changed, video is enormously important, and there is a huge audience for cameras that can handle both stills and motion.

Nikon's acquisition of RED only reinforced its ambitions in professional video. Its recent attention has leaned heavily in that direction, from cinema lenses to updates for the Nikon ZR. From a business perspective, that makes perfect sense.

But as a photographer, I don't necessarily want my stills camera to do everything. Sometimes I just want it to be a really good camera for taking photographs.

So where is Nikon's photographer's camera?

The obvious answer is the Nikon Z f, and it is probably the closest thing Nikon currently makes to what I have in mind.

It's beautifully retro-styled, with proper brass dials, a shutter speed control, and an ISO dial. It acknowledges something camera manufacturers sometimes seem to forget: photographers care about the physical experience of using a camera.

And yet, beneath that traditional exterior, the Z f is still very much a modern hybrid.

It offers extensive 4K video functionality, 10-bit H.265 recording, N-Log, and a fully articulating rear screen designed in part with video and content creation in mind. Those are useful features for many people. I simply don't need them.

That's the point. Why does every serious camera have to serve every possible kind of user?

Why can't Nikon make one camera that simply says: “This is for photographers.”

Leica Gets It

This is where I think Leica has been rather clever, and I have a particularly good example sitting on my desk: my Leica M10.

The M10 is a modern digital camera that doesn't shoot video. It has a full frame sensor, excellent image quality, interchangeable lenses, and very little else competing for your attention. I absolutely love it.

It is simply a camera for taking photographs.

After decades of photography, I've discovered that there is something incredibly refreshing about that.

Less Can Be More

One could argue that Leica's digital M cameras are technologically primitive by modern standards. They omit features that have become routine elsewhere, including in-body image stabilization. But they remain highly capable cameras because Leica has been unusually disciplined about deciding what an M camera is supposed to be.

That is the part I think Nikon has missed.

Leica never abandoned film cameras, either. It still understands that there is an audience for cameras built around the act of photography itself rather than around an ever-expanding list of functions.

The broader camera industry seems to operate on the assumption that more functionality automatically makes a camera better: more video modes, more megapixels, more connectivity, more automation, and increasingly more software doing the thinking for you.

Some photographers, myself included, actually want less.

I want to pick up my camera, attach a lens, set the aperture, set the shutter speed, focus on my subject, and take a photograph. That's it. The camera should be a tool, not something constantly reminding me how many other things it can do.

That simplicity makes me want to take photographs.

The Z f Was So Close

That is what makes the Nikon Z f slightly frustrating.

Nikon clearly understands the emotional appeal of a traditional camera. The Z f looks fantastic, its physical controls are satisfying to use, and it draws heavily on Nikon's own photographic history.

It feels like a camera rather than another anonymous box of electronics.

But Nikon still couldn't quite bring itself to make the Z f purely photographic. Underneath the retro styling is another full-featured hybrid system. That makes perfect sense for Nikon's broader market, but it also makes me wonder what the camera could have been if the company had been willing to exercise a little more restraint.

Imagine a Nikon M

This is what I'd like Nikon to make: something deliberately, unapologetically photographic.

Imagine a full frame Nikon with the company's latest sensor and autofocus technology, wrapped in a body inspired by something like the Nikon F2 or even the older rangefinder-style Nikon S cameras. Make it smaller and simpler, in the spirit of Leica's M series, but unmistakably Nikon.

Give me a proper shutter speed dial, an ISO dial, an excellent electronic viewfinder, and either a fixed rear screen or a simple tilting one.

Give me a mechanical shutter. Leave video out entirely. Skip the creator modes and the endless layers of features intended for people who will never use the camera primarily for still photography.

And make it properly. Metal bodywork. Good mechanical controls. Something that feels as though it was designed to last rather than simply to hit a specification and a price point.

I'd buy one.

I suspect plenty of other photographers would too.

Nikon, Give Us a Choice

I'm not asking Nikon to abandon video.

I'm asking Nikon to give photographers a choice.

The company already has the technology, the lenses, the engineering expertise, and one of the richest photographic legacies in the industry. So why not use all of that to make one camera that deliberately does less?

Leica has shown that there is still a market for cameras built around photography rather than content creation. Nikon doesn't need another specification monster to prove what it can do. It needs a camera that remembers what made so many of us love Nikon in the first place. A photographer's camera.

Nikon, if you're listening... Please make one.