Nikon Is Open to Making More Vintage-Inspired Cameras

Once it got its foothold in the mirrorless camera market, Nikon didn’t waste too much time tapping into its visual heritage and releasing vintage-inspired cameras. The Zfc hit store shelves in 2021, its full-frame brother the Zf came out two years later, and if photographers want more, Nikon says it is happy to oblige.

“As long as the customer wants them, we really want to continue to develop those kinds of cameras because it is kind of a big hit right now. So if the customers want it, we want to continue making them,” Hiroyuki Ikegami, Senior Executive Vice President and General Manager of the Imaging Business Unit at Nikon, tells PetaPixel during an exclusive interview at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) show earlier this month.

That response is a stark contrast to how Nikon’s competitors have looked at vintage-inspired products. Canon, Nikon’s storied competitor, has not released a vintage-inspired camera despite photographers regularly clamoring for such a design. In an interview earlier this year, the company expressed that making something that competes with the Zfc or Zf wasn’t a priority.

“We’re aware of the fact that other companies have provided vintage cameras that have become very popular and we know that there is an expectation for us to provide the same,” Manabu Kato, Unit Executive in Canon’s Imaging Business Operations, said to PetaPixel in February.

Canon’s hesitance is twofold. On one hand, it wouldn’t feel comfortable just making a vintage-inspired camera: it would have to work on optics and accessories too. That significantly increases the cost of development.

“But for us, we wouldn’t be happy with just developing a vintage-looking design. We would need to design everything from scratch for the lens, the accessories. We need to make sure that the entire system is well-balanced. So I think from that perspective, our perception is that this is a consideration, a study that would be very labor intensive for us to look into.”

On the other hand, Canon’s executive team doesn’t seem to think that vintage-inspired cameras have particularly good handling.

“We’re very particular about the operability, like the grip and the handling. And we’re not sure that all of that can be delivered in a vintage design.”

As for Canon’s first worry, Nikon shows it felt similarly when it launched its vintage-inspired Nikkor Z 28mm f/2.8 SE and Nikkor Z 40mm f/2 SE primes, both of which share the same optics with contemporary Nikkor Z lens variants but are styled like Nikon’s legendary film SLR lenses, albeit with a $10 premium. It was an investment Nikon clearly decided was worth it.

Pentax Ricoh feels basically the same way Canon does. In a separate interview in February, Kazunobu Saiki, General Manager, Camera Business Division, at Ricoh, says that making a camera based solely on its design isn’t part of the company’s product development strategy.

“We don’t give special interest to making something based on a historical design, because that is just a model of acting by how something looks. That is not our philosophy,” Saiki said.

Conversely, OM System released the OM-3 earlier this year and while it has a few new tricks compared to previously released OM System cameras, it relies pretty heavily on its design aesthetic as the main selling point.

Nikon’s strategy thus far has been a mix. While it seems to have no issue with making a vintage-inspired camera, it doesn’t see that as reason alone to buy a Zf, for example. When that camera was released, PetaPixel’s Chris Niccolls was very surprised at how much new it brought to the table from a function perspective — something it didn’t necessarily have to do to move units.

“I wouldn’t look at [the Zf] as merely a successor to the Z6 II, but rather a feature-rich camera with some quirks that provide the most enjoyable shooting experience overall. It may look like a blast from the past, but inside it is a real glimpse into the future for Nikon,” Niccolls wrote at the time.

During PetaPixel‘s interview at NAB, Nikon seemed to indicate that sales of its Zf and Zfc were strong and if that continues to be the case, don’t be surprised if it continues to pull at the vintage-inspired thread. Even if its biggest competitors won’t go in that direction, Nikon seems more than happy to.

Image credits: Jordan Drake for PetaPixel