Nikkormat FTN
He was my very first child. I got him for $50 on Kijiji in Toronto. His name is Sesame1.
Sesame is a little odd and doesn't really have anything too special going for him, but he always gets the work done and rarely ever complains. He predated AI (automatic indexing) and only took rare mercury 1.35V button cells, but it didn't really matter as his lightmeter was effectively cooked anyway. Plus, Sesame can operate without power just fine. Each click of the shutter and slap of the mirror were the sound of his mechnical insides at work.
Being Nikon's more affordable offering compared to the classic F line, the Nikkormat was left with only the basic features and a more simplified design. There was no interchangeable focusing screen or viewfinder, no way to natively mount a hot shoe, and it didn't have the Nikon name. However, one of its simplifications was what made me really enjoy this camera.
I originally thought the shutter speed selector being around the lens mount was a strange choice, but I've now realized just how clever the mechanism was. Because the setting to set the ASA/ISO and aperture coupling pin also rotated around the same ring, there only needs to be one central mechanism to tell the camera its overall exposure settings, simplifying the whole design.
In fact, I actually preferred changing the shutter speed this way because I wouldn't have to move my right hand from its regular grip to spin a dial that's normally on the top of the camera. Instead, I can just flick my middle or ring finger to make that adjustment, all without lifting my finger off the shutter release.
When I first adopted Sesame, I didn't own any lenses that had a manual aperture ring except for this Tamron 19-35mm AF, seen in the image above. When the seller saw me pull out this lens, he scoffed and said something about the lens "defeating the whole purpose of the camera" and that it "won't provide the characteristic look" the camera is supposed to produce.
Whatever. I used this lens to capture one of my favourite photos. Although I've since outgrown this photo, I still have a soft spot for it from the inital excitement upon receiving back the scans from the negatives.
He now lives in Chestermere with my friend who's experimenting with film.