Re: Nishika 3D

[P3D Bob Wier <wier@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

|
|I have seen the Nishika numerous times on the market, from Dr.T's table at
|Rochester to some camera flea markets around my town. In each case I had
|passed on it till last week! Wlad Reksc picked one up for me at a local
|camera store in his local. I got it for $35 US, which is kinda pricey

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|didn't know till Wlad send me the camera, that there is two models of
|the Nishika. Both offer bad optics but the more common one, N8000 is
|the one that looks like it has a ton of features, which of course it
|doesn't. At least the N9000 model looks like a regular P&S camera. It's
|a shame that the Nishika had to have poor quality optics because other
|than that the camera is not so badly constructed. 
|

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I've got one Nimslo and two Nishikas. The Nish are interesting from
a curiosity standpoint. For those new here, I can mention that I
think the original selling price was around $900/US which seems a little
high for what is basically a $20/US camera. But it got you a "franchise"
to sell to other sucke.. "customers", in a Multi Level Marketing Scheme,
with the "factory" located in Henderson NV.

I particularly like the 8000 model - if you take the bottom off, you
can remove a cast lead weight of about 2 lbs which is designed to
make the camera feel expensive - a potential use for this is to melt down
for auto tire balancing weights, or it might be handy in a bar fight.

It also has a really nice looking LCD display on the top, which can
be pried off and stuck on the front of your computer monitor, and it
works just as well as it did on the camera originally (no batteries
required!). 

However, it actually does have a use - since I drive around quite a 
bit in the Western US where UFOs seem to land with some frequency
(Roswell, NM - Snowflake, Az, etc) I carry a loaded one around in the
car in the glove box, just in case one happens to land on the highway
in front of me (and I have enough light to photograph it!). I don't
think I'd want to do with with one of my Realists.

One potential problem with the Nishika is that both of the ones
I have had a bad flash hot shoe. If you look at it, there are
a bunch of contacts, but in reality only two of those are actually
attached to wires. The one to the center post tends to break
easily, so you have to take the camera apart to re-solder it back
on again. The problem then is that the camera body has a rather
low melting point, so you have to make sure that you don't heat it
too long or you'll enlarge the hole so much that the pin will fall out.

I put out a message last summer on how to disassemble the camera
which can be found in the archives.

I've had at LEAST $40 worth of enjoyment from my two units :-)

I have to admit, though, that I have actually had some Nish prints
developed at NimsTech and got recognizable results (as long as I
held the camera level - it doesn't work well held vertically (duh)).

--BW

         mailto:wier@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    11:01 PM Monday, March 3, 1997
     Texas A & M University - Commerce
 keeper of the Photo-3d,  Overland-Trails
ICOM radio and LDS State Research Outline Guides
 



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