From Digital Camera World · · 1m 30s
A 1966 Nikon factory film just resurfaced
A 30-minute company documentary from 1966 shows Nikon cameras and lenses being built by hand, and it is now free to watch.
In brief
A 30-minute company documentary from 1966 shows Nikon cameras and lenses being built by hand, and it is now free to watch. Nikon's 1966 film "The Eye of Science" is a rare half hour inside the factory, showing hand assembly, glass grinding and shutter torture tests. Originally reported by Digital Camera World.
A lost Nikon film resurfaces
A 30-minute documentary called The Eye of Science, made by Nikon in 1966, has turned up on YouTube via the Japanese science film archive NPO 科学映像館.
“The Eye of Science, Nikon”
1966, in context
Same year England won the World Cup and Star Trek first aired. In Nikon terms, it landed a year after the Nikon F Photomic T and the Nikkormat FT/FS.
Cameras built by hand
The film follows those then-new models down the line, assembled piece by piece by hand. Nikon F bodies also face shutter durability tests running close to 150,000 cycles.
“approaching 150,000 consecutive cycles”
Glass blocks to lens elements
The best sequence is optics. Rough blocks of glass get chipped into selected cubes, then heated, pressed, precisely ground into spheres, polished and assembled.
Four frames a second
It also covers Nikon's reach beyond the factory, like the Nikon F Motor Drive and its 4-fps burst. Ordinary now, revolutionary then. The waterproof Nikonos I shows up too.
More than cameras
Nikon was never only an imaging company, and the film knows it. Microscopes, telescopes and medical equipment all get screen time across the half hour.
The headline
Nikon's 1966 film "The Eye of Science" is a rare half hour inside the factory, showing hand assembly, glass grinding and shutter torture tests.
