Richard Haw's Classic Nikon Repair and Review

Hello, everybody! I am going to introduce to you Osawa Camera (大沢カメラ) in Ebisu! It’s a lovely little shop that I used to walk-past almost on a daily basis a couple of years ago. I used to live near this shop and I would check their inventory at times. If you just happen to be near Shibuya then please give them a visit, their shop may not look like much from the outside but I promise you that they have a decent inventory.

This is the scene that will greet you once arrive at the shop. The staff there are all nice, it is always nice to have a chit-chat with them. They also offer film processing but I haven’t used their services yet. They have a pretty well-stocked film inventory and the prices are competitive by Tokyo standards. They also have a nice parts box for small camera parts, I would sometimes check to see if I can find something that I need there but I’m yet to find something useful there. Go dig into the parts box and see if you can find something you’ll need in you’re repairs, that spare screw that you have been looking for might be there!

Osawa Camera is near the North Exit of JR Ebisu Station. You can get there using the very convenient JR Yamanote Line. You can follow the map that I embedded above or you can ask somebody at the police box for directions. If you are not the type who uses the smart devices for navigation you can try printing their address down on a piece of paper:

〒150-0022 東京都渋谷区恵比寿南１−1-12

Click on this link to get to their website which doesn’t look like it been updated for some time but that’s all they have. I’m not sure if the owner can communicate in English and I will assume that the won’t entertain any messages that’s not Japanese. They open their doors around 10:00AM and close just before 8:00PM in the evening. They are open every day of the week except on important Japanese holidays so you can be sure that you won’t arrive to a closed shop. They are located at a place with heavy foot-traffic so it makes lots of sense to capitalize on that fact as much as they can.

Here’s the usual accessories that you can find in any decent photography shop.

Here are some trinkets and used cameras. The books there look interesting but I did not check those the last time I was there, maybe I should take a look next time.

Aha, that’s where the good stuff are stored! That wall you see here has plenty of nice and rare gear. If you are into adapting lenses made for obscure lens mounts then this will be a place to look for some hidden junkpots! Come, let’s have a closer look.

Now, this is more like it! They have a decent collection of used lenses and you can find a great deal here if you look hard enough. Their prices are decent to be honest but I would not say that they’re dirt-cheap, I can bet that they are paying a hefty rent every month.

For a small shop that’s out-of-the-way, Osawa Camera has a nice collection of rare stuff. It is amazing how many people haven’t heard of the place yet.

Here are some used Pentax Spotmatics and Nikons. They also have some Nikkors here so check this out when you’re there. If you don’t want to be “mainstream” then these plastic point-and-shoot cameras will probably be interesting for you.

More used cameras! It’s worth noting that while they’re prices seem to be a bit more than the competition the quality of what they sell can somehow justify it. Notice that they look a lot cleaner than what you usually see in the used camera shops here in Tokyo, which is saying a lot because the quality of used gear here in Tokyo is usually higher.

(Click to enlarge)

Enough of the tiny pictures and let’s have a closer view. Click on each image and zoom-in with your smart device, maybe you’ll see something interesting here.

I didn’t see anything interesting on my last trip and austerity made my choices narrower but I wanted to support them so I bought this pack of Fujifilm Industrial 100. I confirmed with a few dealers (and a few friends) and the hearsay is true, these and the 400 variety will soon be sold-out. Fujifilm is just finishing their frozen stock and it’s not going to last very long (this isn’t a rumor, a few Fujifilm booth staff told me about this). This is the why they are pushing people to buy the hard-sell stocks here in Japan because they wanted to sell everything as quick as possible which is a shame.

That’s all for Osawa Camera! Be sure to visit them when you’re in Southern Tokyo. If you happen to be in Shibuya then Ebisu is just at the next station. Be sure to support them by buying something so the business will continue to operate. I make it a point to buy from these mom-and-pop shops as much as possible because they do not have as much capital as the big camera companies. These smaller shops also offer interesting stuff for sale and they’re more likely to carry the things that the bigger camera shops won’t stock like used or obscure equipment. Thank you for supporting the blog and see you again next time! If you like what I publish then please feel free to share my blog to your friends and camera club members. See you again in my next blog post and happy shopping. Ric.

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Maintaining this blog requires money to operate. If you think that this site has helped you or you want to show your support by helping with the upkeep of this site, you can simple make a small donation to my paypal.com account (richardHaw888@gmail.com). Money is not my prime motivation for this blog and I believe that I have enough to run this but you can help me make this site (and the companion facebook page) grow.

Helping support this site will ensure that this will be kept going as long as I have the time and energy for this. I would appreciate it if you just leave out your name or details like your country and other information so that the donations will totally be anonymous it is at all possible. This is a labor of love and I intend to keep it that way for as long as I can. Ric.