In Persuit of Dependability

I have got to the point where I want things to work together with minimal effort after an initial setup. With my camera gear, a little over two years ago, I made the switch from Sony E-mount to Nikon F-mount. A downgrade? Well, not really.

I loved the Sony A7iii, it did everything I wanted and more. I loved throwing the camera into black and white mode to shoot concerts, where I could focus on lighting and composition over the pretty colours of intense concerts. I loved silent shooting, how fast the auto-focus was, and a host of other features that ended up being too much. Which resulted in me taking a step back to shooting film.

It was not an impulse; there was months of research when I finally bought a Nikon F2. It was fully manual and mechanical, had enough shutter speed, lots of lenses, and damn near indestructible. The one I bought came with a 50mm f/1.4 and that was that. I loved it, used it for about a year while using my Sony A7iii of 4 years. At my peak, I had four (?!) 50mm lenses and I couldn't use my expensive Sony glass on the F2 and needed an adapter to use the Nikkor 50mm on the Sony. It was a lot.

When I was given a Nikon D200, I learned very fast that being able to use the same lens on two cameras without any adapters and retain the AF and metering was indispensable. Which is why I made the decision to trade in my entire Sony kit and move entirely to Nikon F-mount.

My current kit is:

• Nikon D610

• Nikon F3AF with HP prism and waist level finder, AS-17 flash adapter

• Nikon F90 with MF-26 data back

• Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 D

• Nikkor 105mm f/2.8 D macro

• Nikkor 28mm f/1.4 D

• Nikkor 135mm f/2.0 D

• Nikon SB-800 speedlight

The three camera bodies work perfectly with the lenses and no compromise of features, the flash can be moved across all the cameras, and everything just works without headache. I don't have to search for adapters (minus the as-17), worry if my autofocus isn't going to work or meter incorrectly, or whatever.

When I pick up a camera to go take a picture, I don't have to worry about something not working; that is the real end goal. Then you can focus on taking the images you want.