I reviewed the Nikon Df when it first came out in 2013, never imagining that it would be another 13 years before I finally owned one. Some people think the Df is a kind of Frankenstein camera, some people think it’s a work of art. It has more quirks, flaws and odd decisions than practically any other camera, but I don’t actually care. I mean, just look at it.
Technically, the Nikon Df is a very odd mix. It has the workings of the Nikon D610, including a distinctly second-rate 39-point AF system, but it also has the 16MP sensor from the Nikon D4, Nikon’s flagship professional camera at the time.
It has classic external shutter speed and ISO dials but, following Nikon’s fateful decision to drop lens aperture rings years earlier, there’s no physical aperture control. You have to adjust the lens aperture via a control ring on the body, checking the rear display or a tiny top-mounted status panel to check the setting. Or you step back in time and invest in Nikon D lenses which do have aperture rings but use slow and noisy AF actuators in the camera body.
I’ve paired my Df up with a modern Nikon 50mm f/1.8G lens, and this setup works fine, but I am looking at some used D-type lenses too. Nikon clearly never anticipated a future demand for manual controls when it dropped aperture rings on its lenses, and this really hurts the Df, which is caught between manual exposure control (only up to a point) and a small PASM mode dial because that was the only way to offer a full set of exposure modes. In A and P modes, the shutter speed dial does nothing, so while the controls look wonderful, the design constraints do dampen their appeal.
The autofocus is fine, really, and the fact that the AF points are clustered near the middle of the frame isn’t a big issue – just don’t expect much from the AF in dim lighting. The viewfinder is gorgeous, the shutter sound is lovely and you even get a threaded shutter release for old-school cable releases.
I don’t mind about the 16MP sensor. I didn’t get this camera for its resolution, but for its looks and the experience of using it. 16MP. is fine for the work I do and the prints I make. Like any incurable pixel-peeper I’d like more, but I don’t actually need more. The Nikon DF is a reminder there’s more to photography than megapixels.
For me, two things really stand out with the Nikon Df. The first is that Nikon really knew how to design and make cameras. The technology has moved on, but those design and manufacturing skills were there from the start. The second is just how big, bright and clear that rear display is. It looks like it’s straight off a modern camera.
Nikon may not be the force it once was in the digital camera market, but the Df is a symbol of its golden era, when Nikon DSLRs led the way for design, ergonomics and technology. In fact, picking up the Df right now, it doesn’t feel like a 13-year-old camera that belongs in a museum. It feels like a modern recreation of a classic DSLR that Nikon could make – and sell – today.