Prior to this, the company was officially called Nippon Kogaku K.K. – many people believe the name changed earlier, but it wasn’t until the late 80’s. 1st April 1988, to be precise, Nikon Corporation was officially (re)born.

Of course, they had been using Nikon as a trademarked brand for many years (history suggests the name Nikon was first invented in the mid 1940’s), so why did they eventually decide to switch? Well, this little story direct from Nikon’s website may shed some light.
Then-president Shigetada Fukuoka met with former French President Jacques Chirac. On hearing the name Nippon Kogaku Kogyo, Mr Chirac simply tilted his head in bewilderment. When Mr. Fukuoka said the word “Nikon,” however, the Parisian mayor understood immediately.
President Fukuoka said “From hereon, I don’t want us to be limited by the name Kogaku (“optics”). Let us work toward even greater advancements.”

Nikon didn’t manufacture their first camera until 1948.

Thirty-one years after the company was founded by the merging of three separate optical manufacturers in 1917, Nikon launched their first camera, the Nikon I. Prior to this, Nikon made lenses under the Nikkor brand, along with binoculars and microscopes.

Demand for the camera in Japan was huge, but it wasn’t without it’s problems. A rush to manufacture left the camera somewhat unreliable, with the film advance often failing to work, which led to many customer complaints and forced Nikon into financial difficulties. However, they rebounded with 1949’s Nikon M and 1950’s Nikon S, then the S2, SP and finally the classic Nikon F SLR, quality and reliability improving with each model.

Nikon originally made all of their now arch-rival Canon’s lenses.

Canon’s first cameras were inexpensive Japanese Leica clones, and in 1934 it announced a 35mm rangefinder called the Kwanon. The Kwanon was just a prototype never put into production – it was followed by their first commercial camera, the Hansa Canon, in 1936. Canon had one problem, however – they didn’t have any experience of making lenses, so they contracted Nippon Kogaku Kogyo, already a proven optical designer and manfufacturer, and used Nikkor lenses. The Hansa Canon actually shipped as standard with a Nikkor 50mm f/3.5 lens.

In fact, a large part of the first Canon camera was made by Nikon – Nippon Kogaku was responsible for the lens, the lens mount, the viewfinder, and the complete rangefinder mechanism. Canon did start developing lenses in 1937, but they weren’t available until after WWII, and they didn’t launch their fast 50mm Serenar f/2 until 1947.

When launched in 1959, the Nikon F cost an average of three months salary.

We may think that we have it bad with the price of today’s digital SLRs, but the first Nikon SLR cost 67,000 Yen – three times the salary of a Japanese government employee at the time. They still managed to sell a million of them over the next 15 years!

This was the camera that introduced us to the F mount – the very same mount (albeit with added features, especially in the electronic age) that is still in use today. This mount was revolutionary at the time, having a huge diameter in comparison to it’s rangefinder peers, which allowed Nikkor F lenses to be far more resistant to mechanical vignetting.

Nikon’s first Digital SLR, the D1, was developed from scratch in just two years.

We may take for granted now that a new camera will be digital, but just over 10 years ago this was certainly not the case. Although the first Coolpix (the Coolpix 100) was produced in 1997, Nikon’s classic D1 wasn’t introduced until 1999.

The order to produce a DSLR came from Nikon’s president in 1997, and engineers responded by saying it would take four years, three at a minimum. They were given two.

The result was a 2.7mp DSLR with many features bettered by even today’s entry-level cameras (and also by it’s contemporary digicams; the Coolpix 100 was 3mp), but at the time it was revolutionary. The D1 quickly displaced Kodak from dominance of the DSLR market, and sales exceeded the target of 100,000 bodies per year even at it’s US$5500 asking price. With the D1, Nikon’s market share eclipsed that of Canon. Strangely, the camera used the NTSC colorspace, not the SRGB or AdobeRGB we use today.

Article originally published at NikonHQ – the web’s premier site for Nikon photographers.

The past of the company is not less interesting than its present. Nikon is a Japanese company which came into picture in the year 1917 however at that time it was not known by the same name. People knew it as Nippon Kogaku Tokyo K.K. but later on, in 1988 the company was renamed to its present name and since then it worked really hard to make a special place for itself in the hearts of the people. There are many products such as cameras, microscopes, spectacle lenses, binoculars and many more which are sold under the same brand name.

Not many people know that the company helped the Japanese military a lot by providing them products such as binoculars, bomb sights, lenses, periscopes etc and in order to meet the needs of its army, the company grew in size to nineteen factories with 23,000 employees. Once the war was over, Nikon returned back to its original business of serving the people.

Nikon is not a well known brand of Japan only but actually the whole world has accepted it whole heartedly. Indians are very particular when its a question of investing their hard earned money and they too hardly think twice before going ahead with the idea of buying anything rolled out of the company. This is the kind of reputation enjoyed by Nikon in India.

You will next want to look for quality binoculars that have a larger objective lens diameter. The lens at the front of the binoculars is the objective lens and the larger size of the objective lens then the more light will be let into the binoculars resulting in a brighter image. In dim light situations such as an overcast sky, bad weather, or in the dark woods where the trees shade the light, then quality binoculars with larger objective lenses are a big advantage. The second number behind the x associated with a binoculars’ description, such as 6×30 or 7×35, refers to the size of the objective lens in millimeters.

Before you go looking for a pair of binoculars you need to sit down and decide what you will be using your new binoculars for. Will you be hunting, whale watching, or watching birds, or looking for a pair of military binoculars. Perhaps you are planning a sight-seeing trip to some exotic location. 
Knowing what you will be using the binoculars for will give you a specific type of binoculars to look for. For example, if you are planning on using your binoculars for birdwatching you want to look for a pair that is designed with good image quality. If you are planning on taking your binoculars on the family boat you will want a pair that is completely waterproof.

A good rule of thumb is, unless you are a private investigator or international spy, avoid buying a pair of binoculars with a magnification/zoom greater then 10x’s. Magnification over ten generally causes the binoculars to lose some image crispness. The image is also duller when the magnification is greater then ten. Some binoculars are designed with a roof prism to make the best use of natural lighting.

Besides cameras, the most popular Nikon product, the company is also engaged in the production of a number of other interesting artifacts including microscopes, binoculars, measurement instruments etc. The Nikon cameras range over a wide variety. There are four popular series which define Nikon cameras. The Nikon F series deals with the SLR cameras of 135 films and the D series comprises of the digital cameras.

The Coolpix series of compact digital cameras is a comparatively new one whereas the Nikonos is a special series of under water cameras. The first Nikon branded camera was introduced in 1948. Before this, Nikon was involved n the production of optical lenses and other optical equipment used in the manufacture of binoculars, cameras, microscopes, etc.

During the Second World War, Nikon with its large number of factories supplied binoculars, bombsights and such other useful equipment to the Japanese military. The first Nikon F series SLR cameras was introduced in 1959 and for the next 30 years, they were one of the most popular cameras used by professional photographers. Later on, Nikon became one of the pioneers of digital camera manufacturers.

The digital cameras revolutionized photography in such an unexpected and remarkable way, that the demand for the Nikon film cameras fell rapidly. Considering the situation, Nikon has presently stopped the production of film cameras and has devoted to the production of digital cameras only. From the very beginning till now, Nikon has continued to produce some of the best cameras of the world.

It has constantly modified its range of products. With the use of newer and improved technologies, Nikon has created such sophisticated and miraculous artifacts that we could not even dream of. Not only for common people and photographers, Nikon has produced cameras and lenses that have been used for scientific research by different organizations.

Nikon was the primary supplier for NASA for its unique and specialized products. Nikon has played a major role in popularizing photography among the common people. Nikon has continuously tried to make photography an easy job for everyone by introducing automatic features in the cameras. It has never failed in its effort to exceed the expectations of its customers and has successfully built up such an extraordinary reputation, that the brand name itself today defines the photographic industry.