I graduated high school in 1987. My friend David convinced me to sign up for a four month merchant marine “experiment.” (I have some great stories about Dave and this little “experiment” for a later date.) While onboard, I witnessed the official merchant marine photographer. He was a much higher rank, which meant he would never give me the time of day, but what he did give me was a chance to observe. This was the first photographer with intention I had ever seen. And I could not figure out what he was doing. He kept moving in odd ways at odd times, and wherever we were, he tended to be in the opposite direction.
I did what all eighteen year olds do. I cursed him. “That guy is a FREAK man,” I said. “Just look at him.” (I’m imagining I said this but can’t prove it.) But slowly over the months at sea, I began to play closer attention to his man. Nikon FA in his hands, one lens only. And then I figured out what was going on. He was moving with the light.
“That’s it,” I thought. This crazy bugger is moving based on how the light is hitting his subject matter. I dug my point-and-shoot camera out of my locker and gave it a go, attempting to mimic the behavior. One of my roommates shaved his head. Another introduced me to The Cult, which I will forever be thankful for. And yes, there were an astounding number of drunken escapades while on liberty. Turn a shipload of eighteen years olds loose on an unsuspecting city like Rio and good things are bound to happen. (I have stories I can’t tell here, that is for sure.) Oh, and one of my other roommates disappeared never to be seen again.
This trip is what planted the practical photography seed.
The Larry Burrows essay “Yankee Papa 13,” had planted the IDEA of photography years before, but this was the first time I had camera in hand and film to burn. After returning home, I dug an old Ricoh camera out of my parent’s closet. It had one of those trippy, 1970s, super wide straps that had two film canisters attached to it. Like Dennis Hopper in Apocalypse Now only without the cool. I was feeling it.
And then, somehow, I ended up with a Nikon N2020. The only bummer, I didn’t have an autofocus lens. Or if I did, I never figured out how it worked. I walked our suburbia neighborhood looking for images, all shot from the street. I climbed to the roof of our house and shot a sunset, an image I thought was potentially the greatest image ever made. With transparency no less. I bragged, explained my mastery of photography to anyone who would listen, and began hunting for a photo vest to complete the facade.
Around this same time, my complete academic failure of a father decided it was his life’s mission to determine the fate of his youngest son. “You need to tell me what you are doing to do for the rest of your life, and I need to know right now or there is gonna be trouble,” he said. “But dad, Miami Vice is on,” I replied while preparing to parry his hook kick. Frustrated, he took me to a career guidance counselor who gave me a three hour test that was guaranteed to determine what I was destined to become. Three hours later, this same man returned. He was ranting, talking to himself and waving his arms as is to signal our little experiment was over. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” he sobbed. “Never, not in all my years.”
He turned the results around and nearly every category of every job known to the history of our species was piled up at the bottom of the page in a muddled heap. The rest of the page was entirely blank except for the top two lines. The first read, “photojournalist,” and the second, “private investigator.” For a brief moment I saw myself in South Florida with a Smith .45, pastel suit and black Daytona, but realized that job was taken. So my mind slowly shifted over the “photojournalist.” Hmm, maybe, just maybe.
And then a long list of odd things happened. I will spare you. Just know I ended up at San Antonio College where I met someone named Jerry Townsend. Jerry was a journalist. Jerry knew photography. Jerry treated me like a staff photographer from day one, even when I admitted I didn’t know how to control exposure. Jerry gave me a scholarship. Jerry put me on assignment on the first day. And Jerry said “Go buy a Nikon FM2, NOW!” This, my friends, is how this Nikon chapter began. (I shot a year of assignments with the FM2.)
At this time, everyone I knew shot Nikon. Canon’s autofocus was fast approaching, and their 2.8 zooms, but at this moment in photo history, it was King Nikon. I would eventually go on to work with the Nikon F3, F4, and even the F6.(Between the newspaper and freelance, I probably shot five hundred different assignments.) And then I found Leica where I spent the bulk of the next twenty five years. (And Hasselblad film, Canon digital.) But I kept my F3HP and FM2T. Tucked away in my photo go-bag, just in case a Central American struggle came to be. (The 1980s, Central America did a complete number on me. See Salvador and Under Fire.) And yes, by this time I had a photo vest, and full disclosure, I did put red tape on one camera and even around the lens hood. I had convinced myself this was critical for making rapid fire decisions under intense pressure even though I was mostly photographing pet of the week and city council meetings.
By 1997 or 1998, I was living in Los Angeles working for Kodak Professional. We had this beautiful art deco apartment with birthday cake plaster and purple and black tile. I was smoking the occasional cigarette, wearing a scarf at all times, and my entire miserable life was about photography. And we did a lot of entertaining. One night a friend came over. He was a Nikon rep on a first date. We ate dinner, talked, no big deal.
Fast forward to 2023. That first date stuck, and that same guy, according to my sources, is now married to that same person, and is still with Nikon, much to my pleasant surprise. Because I had found the Nikon Zf. As many of you know, I don’t do much gear talk because I’m more interested in the end result, but because my gear talk makes certain fragile people lose their mind, I figured I would explain how my Nikon situation came to be. (Up until a month ago, I had seven camera systems.) I’ve always been agnostic about gear. Use what you want, just make sure you ACTUALLY USE IT.
Within a day or two, I knew the Nikon Zf was a solid fit for my needs, but my original reason for purchase was nostalgia.
That’s it. I started my real work with an FM2 and this ZF camera reminded me of that. A pleasant memory. The more I used the Zf the more I realized it was an extremely fun, capable camera. Yes, yes, I still have my Fuji system, and I still use my Fuji system but I have to create a wide range of material for a wide range of client, so I’m often using multiple system at the same time, at least when I’m working from a vehicle.
Once I determined I wanted the ZF to be the camera I carried on a daily basis, I found myself semi-stuck because of my birding interest. To do my “normal” stuff, and do my work stuff, I was faced with needing to carry two different systems at all times. This is a real issue, especially when I’m traveling. I realized if I wanted to venture out with just the Nikon I needed a second body and second lens. Enter the Z8 and 180-600mm. Now I can venture out with Nikon or Fuji and not have to worry to about mixing up batteries or other components.
I’m about to leave for a van-based project and I will have both full systems with me because I need one for stills and the other for motion, and a second person will be assisting with the filming. One of my biggest challenges is making enough content to fill the asks I’m getting from the mothership. I’m on the hook to make an eight-film series. That is a huge amount of content, and nearly impossible for me to create alone. My wife often works with me as well and she loves the Fuji system, and she is familiar with it.
As for menus and lens elements and all the specs. I really don’t care. The Nikons just work, and they allow me to make my pictures without thinking too much about the camera itself. The tech side doesn’t interest me all that much, and you certainly don’t want me doing some sort of technical review. I venture out with visuals goals and do what I can to realize those goals. Most of the time, I fail. That’s the truth. Occasionally, I get lucky. The misses hurt but drive me to return to the field to try again. My style of photography is one frame, high risk, low success, mostly luck based work that is tied to time and access. I don’t shoot a lot of static objects.
The limitations of the Nikon system are based entirely around my limitations.
The same could be said for my laptop, my iPad, my Salsa Fargo Ti and my beloved Royal Enfield. “User error.” I’ve not yet met the photographer who can outperform the Nikon Zf or Nikon Z8. They don’t exist. It is easy to complain these days. “I can’t believe this Z8 doesn’t have a radar detector built in because I’m in a hurry people,” but just think about how far we have come. These cameras are beyond our wildest expectations. Bird detect autofocus? Are you kidding me?
Now you need a little tough love. Go. Just go. Now. Go out and use your camera. Whatever camera that is, use it. If you have yet to decide on a camera, then by all means have a look at what Nikon has on tap. If you want budget, simple, cool, a bit retro, try the Zf. If you are future proofing your career, then aim at the Z8. But whatever decision you make, you must use the machine itself. Every chance you get. Photography isn’t about the Zf or the Z8, ultimately. Photography is about light, timing, and composition, and the best camera is the one you never have to think about.
DISCLAIMER: I am about to give my first ever talk for Nikon and Creative Photo Academy at Paul’s Photo.(Met Mark Comon in 1997 when I worked for Kodak in LA. Another backstory.) As many of you know, I’m not one to cater to the gear review crowd. I have always been more interested in the end result of a camera than the camera itself. When I mentioned giving a talk for Nikon, and that there was a backstory, which you have read above, some people wet themselves in a rage of “Oh, you are just like the gear review people you hate.” Another reason why YouTube is in my rearview mirror. To those people, go away. You will be much happier somewhere else. Don’t need ya. The Nikon kit works for me, but what works for me may or may not work for you. Could be cost, size, etc. I am in no danger of becoming a Nikon spokesperson. My talk is about how we can use the principles of the Enlightenment to talk about why I chose to add these cameras to my mix. Does this sound like a normal gear review talk? Didn’t think so.
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My first camera was a pentax me super. A competitor of the nikon fm (perhaps more correctly to say the nikon FE). Then came digital, then bridge cameras. Then mirrorless. During covid I went back to analog trying some leica a like, like the canon 7. After 24 years From the first purchase, today I went back to using that old slr for a few euros. Maybe because I’m more comfortable photographing with modest tools, or maybe because, as you said in a video on youtube, actually with an fm2 and a 50mm (or 40mm in my case) You can tell everything and you don’t need anything else.
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And then add birds to the equation, and your life as you know it…..ends.
First Nikon F. Later, added F2 Photomic but never used the metering capability, and then an F4s. I hated that one, and traded it for a new F3, which I’d thought had been discontinued when the F4 came out. I had an FM and then an FM2 purely for the higher flash synch. The first Nikon replaced my Exakta…
The slightly rounded edges of the F2 made it more comfortable to use over long periods.
Nice story 🙂 Nostalgia is a big part of choosing whatever is to choose at the moment. I bought my first Pentax body just out of pure nostalgia. Whenever my crapy Zenit 12Xp was broken in high school and I visited a local service guy I was looking at Pentax posters in his workshop. I loved them! On the topic of Nikon, I picked up ZF in a shop for a minute and liked the look, but hated the lack of anything to hold on to, even with 40m it felt clumsy, especially compared to XT5 which was lying on a second shelf. I’m looking for a travel camera to replace my M6+35 on its duty. I need low-light performance and don’t want to deal with safety people at every airport insisting on putting films through scanners 🙁 I can’t test multiple bodies to make up my mind and M10/11 are just too expensive to drag around weird places. Maybe X100V/VI is all I need?
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Huge difference between the Zf and a crop camera. Also, I put the small rig grip on the Zf, cheap and totally solves the issue.
Daniel San: could you talk a bit as to why you didn’t think your Fuji gear would work for birding? Auto focus? Low light performance? Ability to crop? I’m getting more and more into conservation photography, and am always curious as to how people make gear choices (not to turn this into a gear post or anything 🙂)
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Fuji does work for birding. Is it as the Nikon? No. Does the file at crop look like the Nikon? No. Both work, both are great, but as I said in the post, it wasn’t about one system NOT working. It was about NOT having to carry two systems.
Bird detect autofocus. Unbelievable. I’m still shooting with my trusty XPro3 and 35mm f2 lens. But the Zf intrigues, especially the monochrome switch. But in the end, you nailed it with “just go shoot.”
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They all work. Time is the biggest challenge.
Wow!
“I’ve not yet met the photographer who can outperform the Nikon Zf or Nikon Z8.”
This is it to a T for me. I have a pair of D850s and tell myself I’ll ‘upgrade’ when I out perform the cameras. Suspect I’ll be using them for a long time. They are WAY more capable then I am. They are big to travel with though. That would be the only reason I have to part with one and get something smaller/lighter. But it would be like parting with an arm! I’m so used to them.
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I think most of us talk more about the gear than actually use it. I’ve had the Z8 for months now and won’t get another chance to use it until mid June.
Your writing is always entertaining and educational. Your backstory did not disappoint. Thanks Dan. Hope you’re well. -Scott
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thanks Scott!
I remember you talking about that adventure on the ship in one of your podcast episodes. Speaking of podcasts, can’t you release another episode? Cheers from Portugal
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I’ll get there. I might reduce them to ONE topic. Or not.
“Kadank!” was the sound of my Pentax67 I hauled around for 3 years after being a Nikon (and film only) user for 20years.
I was certain I could cope the extra weight (compared to an F4s, just imagine) to gain more film plane which could equal digital after being put through a good scanner, which of course… I didn’t own. So why the burden of mediocre film scanning when digital equaled mediumformat? I know now: because film plane is not defining your photography at all. It’s the subject, the light and the composition as Dan explained a million times on this site. Thanks for that Mr. Milnor. So a little bit of 35mm film is still burned in a F90X/F100 nowadays and scanned on a cheap flatbed because I can’t miss the process of hearing “Kadang!” beside my right ear. For acking and aging reason a OM-M1MkII and smaller lenses are hauled now, with lot less, even no “Kadang!” sounds anymore, just a beep and a “”wieesh!” and no haptic vibration around the eye zone. It’s funny beeping 30fps and capturing zillions of images to get a small bird on sensor. But it’s the tool now as is a Zf or a Z8. It’s the tool and it’s made for things we could’t do as well then on a F100 or a F4/F5, maybe…
I’ve still got my D800. It provides “Kadang!” galore.
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Hey, blasters on stun!
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I love the Pentax. And yes, it sounded like dropping a hammer in a bathtub, but oh well.
I thought the D810 had it right: 36 pixies, and chosen tool of Peter Lindbergh. I’m surprised Nikon has chosen to go with 24 pixies and around 50 rather than have a 36 example in the list. Thing is, I got perfectly good A3+ prints from both my D200 and D700. Unfortunately, my HP 9180 B printer was abandoned by HP just as it started to need TLC. I never replaced it and don’t expect to do so. For online use, ten pixies are perfectly good enough – possibly even overkill.
Regarding the Pentax 67 II: I bought one in order to up my chances with stock images. It didn’t work out that way because digital was just starting to flex its biceps and, as bad, the shutter bounce was incredible. I reverted to Nikon and gave up on stock. Frankly, I pretty much gave up on photography as career and pension. We used to drive up through France en route from Spain to Scotland every year, and I now regret how much of those trips I destroyed by carting equipment along and thinking stock.
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Man, stock died SO fast. I knew guys making 7 figures a year who just stopped over a three month period. Done. Gone. Never to be seen again.
Straight talk by my reckoning. 👍
The line ‘Photography is about light, timing, and composition, and the best camera is the one you never have to think about.’.. Should by law be plastered at the entrance to every camera shop, and on the top of every page of every photography forum.
p.s. I think the new way of using YouTube to tease us over here with links works very well. A nice middle ground that ensures wide capture whilst maintaining a safe distance.
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Thank you. And remember, there will be films. Just not on the Death Star, I mean YouTube.
Dan – I think you liked manual focusing those inexpensive lenses from China on your Fuji system. You have to check out the ARTRALAB NONIKKOR-MC 35mm F1.4 (Full Frame) lenses. They have one that looks just like the Nikkor lenses from the 80’s, and another one that looks like the Nikkors from the 60’s. They’re pretty cool.
Sorry, I forgot to say that I was thinking of these lenses for your new Nikon cameras (specifically thinking about your Zf though). Although, I think they make one for the Fuji system too.
You stinker! Now I’m SERIOUSLY considering buying the Nikon Zf and have been watching YouTube videos on it and associated lenses for three days. I currently have a Fujifilm X100V and love the fixed lens aspect of it. It’s freeing to just take the camera out and just shoot and not having to worry about what lens to bring. But, as I’m newly retired and want to do as much traveling as possible, I want some more flexibility in my photo taking. So, why not?! 🙂
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They are both great cameras. Fuji is smaller and lighter for sure. Nikon offers different ingredients that if important, well, you have a decision to make.