Nikon Nikkormat ELW

Put the ELW next to a Canon EF from the same window and the pitch sorts itself out fast. The Canon gave you shutter-priority and a vertical metal blind; the Nikkormat ELW gave you aperture-priority and the one thing Canon owners kept wanting, a motor that bolted straight on. The W on the end tells you why it exists. This was the EL reworked to take the Nikon AW-1 Auto Winder, so you could fire roughly two frames a second without the body fighting you. For a Nikon shooter in 1976 who did not want to pay F2 money, this was the cheap door into automation.

It is a plain pleasure to shoot. The viewfinder is bright, the CdS cells read through the lens (center-weighted TTL), and a needle along the finder edge points to the auto-selected shutter speed, so you can preview the speed the camera will set before you press down. Set the aperture, leave the dial on Auto, and the electronics pick a stepless speed somewhere between four seconds and about 1/1000. Flash sync lands at 1/120. The shutter itself is a soft, damped thunk, not a slap. Build is dense Nikkormat metal, heavier than it looks, and that mass steadies a slow handheld frame.

The film loading is ordinary Nikon, the focus screen takes a split-prism and microprism collar, and the F mount means every pre-AI and AI lens you can scrounge mounts up. That is the real reason to own one. You are buying into a working system, not a dead end, the same glass an F2 owner uses, for a third of the outlay.

Now for the catch. The whole camera leans on a battery buried in a chamber under the mirror box, not in a floor hatch, so changing it means lifting the mirror and reaching in. People hate this, and a dead cell in the field is a real problem. The shutter is electronically timed end to end, so a flat battery leaves you only the mechanical 1/90 emergency speed (M90) and Bulb, with no metering at all. The light seals on these are usually crumbled by now, and the foam under the mirror bumper turns to tar and wants cleaning before it gums the works. Budget for a service.

Today the ELW is the value play in the Nikkormat line, often cheaper than the all-mechanical bodies because auto-exposure cameras scare people who fear electronics, and frequently more affordable than the Canon AE-1 that everybody chases. That is the bargain. For a backlit doorway or a stage lit from one side, do not hand the whole call to that center-weighted needle. Take an incident or spot reading from the Zone Light Meter app, place your shadows on the zone you want, then dial the aperture and let the auto speed follow. The body reads an average and cannot see your intent. Pair the app with the winder and the cheap glass and the ELW does work you would otherwise pay a lot more for in a prettier shell.