Classic Camera Reviews

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Jon Sienkiewicz  |  Apr 21, 2023  | 

Can a 15-year-old DSLR compete with modern mirrorless marvels in any category? Let’s see what the Pentax K20D is all about before you decide.

Jon Sienkiewicz  |  Apr 14, 2023  | 

You’re hiking in the forest and stumble upon a friendly grizzly bear who’s seated comfortably on a fallen log. You left your big camera at home to lighten your load, and the anemic lens on your smartphone just won’t do the situation justice. Without having a real camera with you to document the scene, how can you answer, once and for all, that age-old question, “Do bears sit in the woods?”

Jon Sienkiewicz  |  Feb 04, 2022  | 

What’s the best thing to do with an old, sub-2-megapixel camera? Go out and capture some remarkable images, that’s what.

Can you take good pictures with a 1.2-megapixel camera? Can anyone? Here’s a small album of images shot with a diminutive Sony CyberShot DSC U10 to challenge your preconceptions. The images were all captured 20 years ago at various locations in the US, Germany and Japan.

Jason Schneider  |  Aug 28, 2020  | 

When it comes to capturing timeless and transcendent photos, everyone knows that the person behind the camera is the most crucial factor and that the particular gear, he or she used, is less important. However, the camera is not insignificant to the creative process.

Henry Anderson  |  Nov 05, 2019  | 

The Fujifilm X-T1 has been around for half a decade and has been succeed by two other models – the X-T2 and X-T3 – but it's still an excellent mirrorless camera, according to photographer Mattias Burling. In fact, he calls the Fujifilm X-T1 an "affordable gem," that's worth buying today.

Jason Schneider  |  Aug 27, 2019  | 

The landmark Kine Exakta camera of 1936 was world’s first successful 35mm SLR. Although the Russians announced their Sport 35mm SLR a year earlier, this ingenious but ungainly clunker was made in limited quantities from about 1937-1941 and distributed only in the Soviet Union. The Kine Exakta, on the other hand, was an instant international success and its maker, Ihagee of Dresden, Germany, produced it and its successors in huge quantities, enjoying robust worldwide sales.

Jason Schneider  |  Apr 24, 2019  | 

I confess to being a cantankerous old coot who cut his photographic eyeteeth deep in the analog era.

Shutterbug Staff  |  Apr 17, 2019  | 

There's was a time, not long ago, when the Fujifilm X-Pro1 was at the top-of-the-heap of the mirrorless camera world. Nowadays, though, you can get this retro-style digital camera for a reasonable price, which is why classic camera reviewer Mattias Burling says the 16MP X-Pro1 is a must-buy for bargain hunters.

Dan Havlik  |  Apr 16, 2019  | 

Now here's something very cool for fans of Nikon's classic analog SLRs. Nikon Rumors has unearthed the below commercial from 1997 for the Nikon F5, which spotlights one its most unique features.

Shutterbug Staff  |  Mar 25, 2019  | 

If you want a quality compact camera for street photography but don't want to spend an arm and a leg, the Pentax MX-1 from six years ago is still a great buy, according to Mattias Burling, who reviews older cameras on his popular YouTube channel. Selling for only a few hundred dollars online (and even less if you hunt around the used market), the Pentax MX-1 is a legend of a camera, Burling contends.

Dan Havlik  |  Mar 08, 2019  | 

The K-1 was launched back in 2016 but this first-time full-frame DSLR from Pentax is still a solid camera to buy today, according to classic gear guru Mattias Burling. In Burling’s video below with “5 Reasons to Buy the Pentax K-1 in 2019,” he calls the Pentax K-1 an “affordable full frame monster.”

Jason Schneider  |  Jan 30, 2019  | 

Practically any analog camera can be pressed into service as a street camera—the late great Weegee used a 4x5 Speed Graphic to expose the seamy and sentimental sides of New York City, and the incomparable Vivian Maier stalked the streets of Chicago with a twin-lens Rolleiflex. But when it comes to discreet shooting on the fly, nothing can quite match a 35mm rangefinder camera as proven by the timeless work of countless photojournalists over the past 90 years.

Dan Havlik  |  Jan 28, 2019  | 

Classic digital camera expert Mattias Burling does a great job on his YouTube channel of spotlighting slightly older cameras that are still worth buying today. In his latest video, he takes a look at a mirrorless model that might have been ahead of its time: the Olympus Pen E-P1 from 2009.

Dan Havlik  |  Nov 16, 2018  | 

We have sung the praises of the Nikon Df on Shutterbug several times before so it’s nice to know we’re not the only ones still infatuated with this retro-styled DSLR from 2013. Photographer Mattias Burling who takes second looks at recent classic cameras on his excellent YouTube channel has put out a video titled “5 Reasons to Buy a Nikon DF in 2018 - As underrated as it gets.

Jason Schneider  |  Sep 19, 2018  | 

As I confidently predicted last time, you can’t possibly please everybody when it comes to picking the best, the greatest, or the most influential cameras ever made. After we posted our list of The Top 20 Greatest Cameras of All Time, it came as no surprise that we received a ton of emails, varying in tone from pugnacious condemnation, to anguish, to polite suggestion, all begging to differ with our first top ten choices.

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