Opinions on John Nesbitt cameras?

[Daniel_5275]

Hi All,

I was wondering if anybody has any experience of 5x4 wood Technical field cameras made by John Nesbitt. Good/bad/indifferent? Specifically for landscape work. They look gorgeous, but does it rank up there with the best?

Any comments gratefully received.

Thanks, Dan.

[paul owen]

Daniel, unless you want one for "sentimental" reasons or to put on a shelf - give them a miss! This is my opinion only! But based on the experience I shared with an owner of one of these on a LF workshop. It was heavy, awkward to set up, had limited movements and looked ... homemade. The camera also wobbled about a bit on a tripod and movements were difficult to lock down. Now this may have been a "one off" - but try as we might there was no room for adjustment of the controls and this guy had owned the camera from new and it wasn't worn! Needless to say the owner of this camera swore he would get rid of it as soon as the workshop finished and look for something else. On the workshop he had the opportunity to compare the Nesbitt with cameras from Ebony, Toyo, Wisner and Canham.

[Clive Alex]

I had a Nesbitt GS54 and found them to have a lot of charactor, they're becoming quite rare since John retired. I bought the Nesbitt because I was board of all the commercially made cameras and wanted somthing a little different. I had a lot of fun using it but the cameras do have a homemade look to them and quality control varies from one to another. They're heavy but solid and would take a fall much more so than a Wista. They don't hold their value, like a Ebony or Wista or have their percision in construction, but they do have some unique features though. I sold mine due to all my cameras having a standard Linhof, Wista, Ebony lens mount, were the Nesbitt didn't which limited me to the lens I was using with it.