Camera Review: Nikkormat FT2

Nikon FT2 with Nikkor 35mm f/2.0

Now that I've finally gotten some good use out of this camera, it's time for a review. The Nikkormat name was given to the consumer-level line of cameras manufactured by Nikon through much of the 1960's and 1970's. This particular model, the Nikkormat FT2, was manufactured from 1975 to 1977 as the successor to the FTn. So this camera is just about as old as I am. It's a metered manual camera, meaning you set the aperture and shutter speed yourself, and there are no automated modes available.



The FT2 is available in black and chrome, and the going rate for a working one seems to run about $25 to $35 for the body alone. It's really not a bad price, if you don't mind dealing with some of its quirks (which I'll tell you about).  Personally, I found mine locally on Craigslist from a guy who had moved away from film, and he sold me the FT2 along with a Nikkor 35mm f/2.0 (non-Ai) for $70 total. Since the going rate for this lens on eBay is $85 to $100, I figure I basically got the FT2 body for free.

Build and Layout

The shutter speed selector ring
and self-timer switch

The Nikkormat FT2 is built like an absolute tank. It has an all-metal construction, and as such it's pretty heavy.  It weighs in at 1.7 pounds (780g) without a lens! Mine has some brassing along the edges, which is to be expected, and there are some imperfections on the baseplate, but otherwise it has held up quite well over the last 40 years. They made the rather strange decision not to print the camera model prominently on the front of the body, like they have with just about every other camera. Instead, there's a small "FT2" etched on the back of the camera next to the serial number.

ISO selection needle

The shutter speed selection is done via a ring at the base of the lens mount. It's a bit too close to the lens aperture ring for my taste, and the protruding lever that you use to rotate the ring is on the lower left side of the camera, which takes a little getting used to.  That lever contains a small spring-loaded knob that you can pull out to release the lock on the ISO selector, located on the underside of the shutter speed ring. As if that wasn't enough, the shutter speed ring also contains a display that verifies that you've mounted the lens correctly. We'll get back to that momentarily.

On the top panel, you have the standard equipment. The film rewind knob, the film advance lever, the shutter release button, and the frame counter.  The film rewind knob is pulled up and out of the body to release the film canister, but unlike many cameras, it does not also open the film door.  This is instead accomplished by a small tab on the lower edge of the door, on the latch side.  The top panel also contains a plunger that acts as a depth of field preview button, and a small metering display. The top panel metering display is one really nice benefit of this camera that isn't seen on many from this time period.

Rewind knob and meter display

Frame counter and film advance lever.
Front left: depth of field preview button

The front panel has a self-timer switch on one side of the lens, and on the opposite side it has the lens release switch, and a mirror lock-up switch. The mirror lock-up switch operates independently of anything else, which is nice.

Finally, there's the viewfinder. Like most 35mm SLR viewfinders, it's big and bright. It has the split-image rangefinder spot in the center, with a microprism collar.  A wider circle is etched into the screen to show the boundary of the center-weighted area. On the right side you have the meter display, showing a centering needle pointing to + or - on either end, or in the center to indicate correct exposure.  At the bottom of the screen is a shutter speed display, with the selected shutter speed in white and the next and previous steps printed in yellow.  This display changes with the position of the shutter speed ring, and it's lit by the scene (so don't expect to be able to see it in low light).

Mirror lock-up switch and lens release

The shutter itself is fully mechanical, meaning you can use it without batteries at any speed, as long as you know how to work without the light meter. It's capable of 1 sec to 1/1000 sec, plus bulb, and flash syncs to 1/125. Speeds outside of the flash sync range are printed in red on the selector ring.

The FT2 in Use

Using this camera is a bit weird, I'll admit.  It may be a side effect of its age, but while the shutter speed dial does click into place at each stop, it has this weird damping that allows it to move uncomfortably within that click stop. Sometimes you're not sure if you pulled it too far.  When you do change the shutter speed, the areas in between speeds cause the meter to blank out until the ring clicks into a stop. Combined with that play in the ring, it means that sometimes I have to wiggle the shutter speed ring around a little to get the meter working.  Also, the ISO selection is a bit strange, where you're pulling out on the end of the shutter speed selection lever and simultaneously sliding a small needle to a spot adjacent to your desired speed. Although I do appreciate that it's locked into place, because I could easily see it being bumped to a different setting otherwise.

Another possible sign of age is the film take-up spool. You need to get the film leader into a slot of the take-up spool, and then rotate it one full turn to ensure that a sprocket hole has snagged on a tooth in that slot.  Unfortunately, I have the absolute worst luck with this.  It's harder than it is in any other camera that I've ever used, and it sometimes takes me upwards of 5 minutes to get the film seated correctly without popping out of the slot as the spool begins to turn. On the upside, when I do finally get the film loaded, the film advance feels clean and smooth, and requires little effort to move from one frame to the next.

Meter coupling pin

Then there's the lens mounting.  If you're not familiar with non-Ai Nikon bodies, the lens mounting dance can seem a little strange. In the case of the FT2, the procedure involves first "resetting" the meter coupling pin on the camera body (located near the name plate, the coupling pin much be pushed toward the lens release switch until it clicks into place and stays there). Then the aperture ring on the lens needs to be set to f/5.6.  This puts the "rabbit ears" in the correct place to allow the lens to be placed on the body with the meter coupling pin in the middle. The lens is rotated clockwise until it locks into place. Finally, the aperture ring must be racked all the way over to the wide open aperture, and then all the way back to the minimum aperture. This "indexing" allows the camera to know the endpoints of the lens aperture settings. If this is done correctly, the red dot on the lens aperture display on the camera's shutter speed ring will point to the correct maximum aperture of the lens.

Lens attached with meter coupling pin
inside "rabbit ears" prong

Lens aperture index indicator: red
mark indicates an f/2 lens is mounted

Oddly, the shutter speed selection lever can cover the lens release switch, so you have to change the camera's shutter speed in order to change lenses. Oh, and the meter doesn't like low light very much, so below a certain threshold it will just stop operating, even if there's room left in the settings to adjust.

One last strange behavior, which is common to many Nikons, is the fact that the meter is only turned on when the film advance lever is pulled out a step. If the lever is pressed flush against the body (as it normally would be with any other camera manufacturer), the meter is disabled.  Normally, I wouldn't mind that extra step, because it does help extend battery life.  The problem is that I'm left eye dominant, which means that if I want the meter enabled while I'm looking through the viewfinder, the film advance sticks out uncomfortably close to my right eye.

So What's the Word?

Okay, there are definitely some strange design decisions at work here. But after taking it with me on a trip to California, and then bringing it along on a nice hike in the woods of Central Florida, I've gotten pretty used to its quirks. It really is built to take a beating, and I'm a sucker for fully mechanical shutters, so it gets bonus points for that. It sounds great, and the meter has been surprisingly accurate.  The non-Ai body means that you can mount any non-Ai, Ai, or Ai-S lens as long as it has the rabbit ear prongs installed, which is nice (Ai and Ai-S bodies require lens modification to fit non-Ai lenses, making non-Ai bodies the most compatible).

So would I recommend it? I guess it depends.  For the money it competes with others from its era, like the Pentax K1000 or Spotmatic II, and I would choose the FT2 in a heartbeat. I have both of those other cameras, and the Nikkormat has a better flash sync speed, has the top mounted meter display, and has the mirror lock-up switch. I also prefer the split-image rangefinder with microprism collar to the microprism-only spot that the other two offer.

If you're looking for a body to mount to your existing non-Ai glass, then this is a no-brainer. It's the last non-Ai model that Nikon made, and has a number of benefits over the older FTn. If you're looking to get started in film photography and you're trying to decide which sub-$50 camera to start with, I can recommend this for that purpose as well. However, if you're willing to put a little more money into the hobby, then there are other options that I would look at instead.

For what it's worth (not much, I'm afraid), I have a Flickr photo album containing photos taken with the FT2 (as well as the photos above of the camera itself). It's updated with new photos from time to time, as I use the camera.

Did I miss anything, or say something stupid? If you have anything to add or questions you'd like answered, feel free to leave a comment!