Sunday I went to a nearby thrift store, Maj-R-Thrift to mull over some new ideas on an old photo project, the nominal subject of which is thrift stores. I found what I think is the silver bullet for this project [an idea], PLUS I found another interesting vintage camera. Behold the Nikon F35 AF (click on pic to see the set).
This is a competent little shooter - and the interface is appealing and easy - but I think I should do my part to prevent the spread of Internet Overhype as regards this camera. It's not great. Not even good by my standards. The tone, color, and contrast were unpleasantly characteristic on the one roll of Fuji Reala I spent on this camera. It wasn't so far off that I couldn't bend the scanned, digital negatives back to reality, but it is not a good place to start from. Every bit of information I found about this camera online said that it was great. It's not. If it were as great as they say, you find some variation of this camera - Nikon One Touch, Sears knockoffs, etc. - in so many thrift stores. Since discovering this camera I briefly considered collecting all the fascinating variations on its design; it is like its own phylum in the taxonomy of film cameras. But the general crappiness of even the original made me think better of it.
Looking at this camera from my perspective - relatively ignorant, absolutely remote in time - it makes me wonder what made it so appealing. Actually it looked appealing to me after I read about the camera - I thought I had a great find. Even when I first got the CD of digital negatives from the lab, it took me a while to admit that they were junk. Sometimes when I am convinced of a camera's/lens' quality before actual use, it is very difficult to see what I am actually looking at.
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