The Earliest Surviving Production Nikon Camera Is Going Up For Auction Starting Around $100,000
This classic Nikon rangefinder would be the key piece in almost any camera collection
Photography can be a pretty expensive hobby, but vintage camera collecting, can get truly outrageous. The venerable Westlicht auction house is currently getting ready to sell the earliest production Nikon camera still in existence, and the bidding starts at 90,000 Euro.
The camera is a Nikon One, which is the “3rd of all Nikon production cameras,” and was created in April of 1948. It’s coupled with a Nikkor-H 2/5cm (50mm f/2) lens, which the auction claims is the “11th lens made according to the serial number. The camera has actually been featured in several books about the history of Nikon cameras.
The camera itself looks super clean, which suggests it has been a collector’s piece for quite some time. I have always been a big fan of the classic rangefinder look, but unless a camera is hopelessly broken, it hurts me to let it sit on a shelf, like this one probably will for the rest of its days.
The camera itself looks super clean, which suggests it has been a collector’s piece for quite some time. I have always been a big fan of the classic rangefinder look, but unless a camera is hopelessly broken, it hurts me to let it sit on a shelf, like this one probably will for the rest of its days.
Still, it sure would be cool to own a piece of Nikon history like this. You have to wonder how many old pieces of camera collecting gold are just hiding away in attics, basements, storage lockers, and lost collections.
