10. Sigma 200-500mm f.2.8 APO EX DG
Just barely in the top 10 viewed analog cameras (or items I guess it should be as this is a lens, not a camera) of 2017 is the beast of a lens that is the Sigma 200-500mm f2.8 APO. It was made by Sigma mostly to show off their engineering skills and not so much for actual usage. To prove that point, they packaged the BIGMA (about 15kg in itself already) with the original case that is so big that you cannot take it as standard check-in luggage on an airplane as it goes over the 23kg size limit of most airlines. This one was a Demo unit from the Finnish importer that ended up in the hands of Kameratori and got a new loving home in a far away country thru our site. Going a bit overboard in product design seems to be a good trick for marketing also outside of the car industry.
9. Hasselblad 500C Body, Silver
(black paint model pictured)
It seems everyone wants one sweet piece of 6×6 Swedish goodness. This list is based on most viewed items on the Cameraventures.com platform. If there were multiple instances of the same item, their views were counted together. Therefore it is only natural that the most common and most budget-friendly unmotorized Hasselblad body available made the list. It also helps that Hasselblad made so few different models and this C model primarily in the Chrome/Silver finish – for example Olympus OM series did not make the list at all 🙁
8. Nikon 35-70mm f3.3-4.5 AF Nikkor
Absolutely nothing exciting in this lens in terms of specs or desirability, but it fits into the list for two main reasons: availability and price. The main point to understand about this entry is that there are a lot of beginners coming into the analog camera market (and maybe some finding themselves with a cheap copy of the earliest D700 and D3 full frame digital bodies) and this is the cheapest AF lens you can buy for Nikon. With luck this lens can be found on eBay for 10€, but it seems there is plenty of interest for it with a bit higher price tag also, when it is checked out by a professional and with fast shipping. A lot of people buying entry level film age gear? That is good news for the community!
7. Nikon FM Gold + 50mm F1.4 AI “60th Anniversary”
A very special item, and one of the Top 5 expensive ones we had this year available. The most special thing about the FM Gold is that it was only given out for employees, never sold, like most gold editions out there. The second most viewed unique item of the year is still available if you have 9999€ extra here:
More info about it here: https://www.cameraquest.com/fmgold.htm
6. Nikon 300mm f4 ED AF Nikkor
Again an item with less flare, but a very good reason to be interesting. If you are looking for good price-quality ratio tele lens, this is definitely up there in the most interesting lenses available. With the ED glass and semi-decent manual focus it is also an ok option to mount on a older manual Nikon body or to mount with an adaptor to M4/3, Canon EF and Sony digital systems, which undoubtedly will count for some of the traffic – even though we mostly concentrate on the analog side as a platform.
5. Nikon F2 Photomic Body, Black
The Nikon F2 is one of the most available bodies we have had this year, even now when I am writing this, there are 4 in silver and 3 in black available https://cameraventures.com/products/search-Nikon%20f2%20photomic There are two main reasons for this. Firstly it is made better than a 1980s Toyota Hilux – meaning it is almost indestructible when maintained properly. All the ones that were made, but not dropped in the sea, are available still – although most being dented and worn and unserviced for years. The second reason is that whenever our platform has a Nikon F3, Nikon FM2, Canon AE-1, Olympus Mju II or the like internet hyped body, it is sold very fast and there are very seldom enough cameras on the platform to compare to eachother before making the decision and hence there are less page views for those bodies.
4. Fuji GX617 Professional + Lenses & Accessories
The single most viewed item in 2017 on the site is this sweet 6×17 panoramic package from Fujifilm. With three lenses, the custom made case, like new condition and all the goodies it is something many landscape photographers would trade an organ for. Someone even offered us a kidney for it, but we are a bit hesitant about going into organ selling. Contributing to the amount of views, both Bellamy aka Japan Camera Hunter and Vincent aka One Year With Film Only posted about this beauty when they visited Finland in the fall.
3. Nikon FM Body, Silver
The second most popular body on the site in 2017 was a silver Nikon FM. Selling at a median price of 105€ I argue that this is the smartest money you can use on a mechanical film camera of any kind. You get almost all the functions of the hyped FM2 in half to one third of the price. It is also significally lighter than a F2 or F3. The light meter also uses LR-44 batteries rather than the harder to find or more expensive batteries of the Olympus and Canon bodies that would otherwise we be in the same price range.
2. Nikon 85mm f1.8 AF Nikkor
The top viewed item list is surprisingly strongly dominated by Nikon items. Is an average Nikonist more careful and comes and checks the listing more often than any other brand fan? Nope, that is more down the alley of a Pentax or Leica fan. The main reason for Nikon pages to rank so high is that the main competitor for the masses, Canon, is spread over in two systems, the Canon FD and EF (or three if you count EF-S) and within these systems they also released much more models than Nikon. Especially the very loved 85mm portrait focal length gained from the Canon transition period, as the Nikon 85mm f1.8 AF came out in 1987 and the Canon equivalent came out five years later in 1992. The Nikon is also seen as a great lens, even by today’s standards while Canons f1.8 is only seen as an OK piece of glass. Canon also made a budgety 100mm f2, which cut into the sales of the 85mm f1.8. That means that one of the most wanted lens types for any film or digital user- a portrait lens – is very abundantly available for Nikon with full backward compatibility to manual film bodies.
1. Nikon F5 body
The most viewed item of 2017 on Cameraventures.com and Kameratori.com is the Nikon F5 body. The pinnacle of film body design, that was largely used as the base for Nikon’s first Digital D1 and D2 professional digital camera series, is undoubtedly a masterpiece. That is only, however, a part of the story of why it attracts so much attention. One big reason for the interest in it is that people who still remember what it cost in the 90s just can’t believe it is a 250€ body nowadays. If someone had told the average Nikonist in 1998 that the Nikon F5 would be the same price as an FM2 in twenty years, he would have mocked him more than in an average standup roast. At the time the F5 was the ultimate dream for many. However, the price is low today for a reason. The Nikon F5 is a big professional camera, with no option to make it smaller by taking a smaller battery pack like in the F4. Lugging it around for a hobbyist is something that one has to be sure about, seeing that you can get a Nikon F100 with most of the features and half the weight for the same price. When people really really want something but are not quite sure if it would suit them, they come back to look it at again and again. That generates a lot of traffic, which earns the Nikon F5 the most viewed analog camera of 2017 title!