SHOW US YOUR CAMERAS!!

[stevemark]

Probably the most sophisticated analog SLR ever built - the Minolta Dynax 7 (also known as Maxxum 7). Here's a nice set I just got yesterday, including the Minolta AF 3.5-4.5/24-105mm zoom, the Minolta AF 2/28mm fast wideangle and a 3600 HS D flash.



The Dynax 7 has a few features one would expect from a digital SLR, but not from a film camera - such as a kind of EXIF data recording, a LCD monitor on the back (which makes her look like an early DSLR), and lots of buttons.

EDIT:

Here's the rear side




Doesn't she look like a real early DSLR? In fact around 1995-2000 Minolta did produce some of the technologically most advanced DSLRs. Sadly, the then head of Minolta (the son of its founder) was stubbornly convinced that digital photography would never succeed. It was his decision that the extremely expensive early Minolta DSLR (RD-175 [1995], and RD-3000 [1999]) would be put into the cheapest plastic SLR bodies available - and not into the beautiful full metal (stainless steel!) body of the Dynax 9!

So in the year 2000 the Dynax 7 was born. Would it have been a digital SLR (as the engineers wanted it to be) I'm pretty sure Minolta would still sell cameras today. When finally in 2004 the digital Dynax 7D came out, it was too late, even though the Dynax 7D is extremely well made given the fact that it is not a professional DSLR.

S

[pentaxpete]

My Camera Club and Fellow Flickr member who buys gear at Car Boot Sales gave me a 1978 COSINA CSM M42 mount camera to test then said i could KEEP IT ! I thought the 55mm f2.1 aperture 'auto-Cosinon' lens was not quite as sharp as the 50mm f1.9 Cosinon on my Cosina CT-1. The CSM has 'Stop-Down' metering and as you press shutter release lens stops down and meter activates and you have to turn aperture ring until a GREEN light appears in top of viewfinder !

I did a VIDEO Review about it which you can see here :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTnGcDluDs4

[stevemark]

Those Cosinas are usually overlooked - as much as the Mamiya Z series are. At the age of twelve I've been using my fathers Mamiya ZE to take my first images. Later on, when I was sixteen, I bought my own Mamyia, this time a ZM:



Like the Cosina CT-1 or the CSM, it is very much a "no frills" SLR, however in a different way. The Mamiya ZM is - unlike the Cosinas - constructed around an electronic shutter. While the ZM can be used as a manual camera (with shutter speeds ranging from 1/1000 s to 8 s), I usually relied on its automatic exposure (AE) mode. After pre-selecting the aperture, the camera would select the proper shutter speed. The separate AEL mode (auto exposure lock) allows you to measure the important part of your subject, lock the corresponding shutter speed by half-pressing the shutter, re-frame the image, and then actually take the image by fully pressing the shutter. Another method to correct AE values relies on over-/underexposure: the large "+/-" dial on the top left side of the camera allows you to dial-in +/- corrections of up to 2 EV. This was pretty useful for quite a few situations, especially for backlight sceneries and snow landscapes.




This image shows how straightforward and clean the ZM was designed. Especially the rubber structure on the focus ring of the Sekor E-S lenses was twenty years "too early"! In addition, the Sekor E and EF lenses were small, lightweight and pretty good - at least if you were lucky to have gotten a good sample. Those Mamiya Z series SLRs certainly were budget cameras, and quality control may not always have been a top priority. Nevertheless I've enjoyed my ZM and the corresponding lenses tremendously - mainly while shooting girls and rock concerts, back then

S

[kansalliskala]

I like the industrial design of that Mamiya.

[pentaxpete]

Thanks for a good review -- maybe I will get one to 'test' sometime !

[stevemark]

Here's another Konica - the legendary "T", equipped with an early Hexanon AR 1.4/57mm.




The coatings of the 1.4/57mm lens are really looking great if you you watch them at the right angle.

The Konica AR 1.8/85mm shown on the right of the Konica T is a very nice portrait lens. It has a rather low contrats wide open - which can be useful for portraits - but gets really excellent at f5.6. This early version has some slightly yellowish glass; later versions with rubber ring are more neutral in colors. I got this copy on a flea market for a really low price, somthing like CHF 8.-- as far as I remember.

The Konica AR 4/21mm is an early retrofocus superwide, and its lens section is extremely similar to the Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 4/20mm. However, the large single postive front lens of the Flektogon was replaced by a doublet, probably improving the color correction. The AR 4/21mm has an extremely uniform performance from f4 up to f16. This lens was part of a set which I bought a few years ago for about CHF 90.--.

S

[kansalliskala]

really nice set!

[stevemark]

Another Minolta, the "downgraded X-700" aka X-500, here shown with the corresponding MD-III lenses 2/135mm and 2.8/200mm.



The X-500 and X-700 cameras have one of the very best SLR viewfinders I know - much larger than e. g. the later Nikon (D)SLRs. Both cameras should be combined with the Minolta MD-1 motor drive. This one, again, handles superior to the motordrives for the Canon New F-1 or the Nikon F3, but it is slower (only 3.5 fps).

The X-500 does have a few nice features which make it - in my opinion - more useful than the earlier X-700, among them the light metering in manual mode, and the TTL flash sync speed (fixed 1/60s with the X-700, variable / adjustable with the X-500).

S

[NikonAIS]

[DigiChromeEd]

[stevemark]

The rather common Konica Autoreflex T4 SLR with Konica AR 1.4/50mm (2nd version). On the right two not-so-common Konica AR wideangle lenses, the AR 2.8/21mm and the AR 2.8/24mm II:



S

[Zamo]

[DigiChromeEd]

[stevemark]

[Blazer0ne]

...

[stevemark]

[stevemark]

... and since we just are at it - here are the two lenses, AR 4/21mm and AR 2.8/21mm:



Of course DigichromEd's T3 is much better preserved than my T ...

S

[DigiChromeEd]

My "twins"

[stevemark]

[stevemark]

A few days ago I found a rather early "Miranda T" SLR, shown below. According to 1992 McKeowns it's the second only of the numerous Miranda SLR models, produced in the 1950s. The first version of the "Miranda T" (which distinguishes itself from the second model only by its "Miranda Camera Co" instead of the original "Orion Camera") was the first Japanese SLR with exchangeable prism finder - certainly a kind of milestone for Japanese camera history.



The shutter is a bit limited, going only from 1/30s to 1/500s. The camera is quite well made - maybe not as refined as a contemporary (early) Pentax, but certainly not much inferior. The viewfinder is surprisingly bright for a SLR from the 1950s (in daylight certainly much brighter than the rather dim EVFs we got used to during the last few years).

An interesting find indeed!

S

[HansMoleman]

Nice find. Run a roll of film through her and post up some results........please. I love the photos by the older stuff.

[stevemark]

[marius.zaech]

A heavy sucker but an absolute joy to use... especially with some nice Zeiss and Yashica glass such as the 21/3.5!!

[DigiChromeEd]

Lovely!

[visualopsins]