A new camera?
I loved my old SLR camera, a Minolta Dynax 500si, for which I have two lenses, a 35-70 and a 70-210. But a year or two ago, I realised that I hardly ever used it, and that I had to go digital. Not knowing much about such cameras, I bought a Polaroid PDC 4350 (4.2 megapixels) because the spec looked good at the price. And it’s a good camera in many ways – it’s handy, and it takes good landscape photos. However, it takes ages from I press the button till it actually does anything, so it’s nearly useless for taking photos of people. 🙁
Buying a new camera soon is a bad idea at the moment – replacing kitchens is expensive! – but I’d like to start thinking about what to go for. In an ideal world, I’d love to be able to use my old lenses, and ever since Miriam and I had those photos taken for Idith’s birthday, I’ve wanted a camera with a shutter release cable badly! Would such a camera still cost a fortune?
You’re right it is hopeless – you could grow a beard waiting for your shutter release – in fact even I could probably grow one 😉
Why don’t you look into the digital minolta dynax series? I had all the minolta bits in the 90s (5000i, 7000i, and a professional minolta with 3 lenses: 24mm 28-80mm 70-310mm – they were streets ahead of the pentax, the olympus and the praktica I also had – I’m starting to remember why you think I’m a nerd 😉 My dad also had a bunch of Nikons which were nice, but I did still prefer mine (don’t tell him tho – Am sure he only bought his cos he liked the Paul Simon song Kodachrome!) All the photos I ever took that were published in the press were all minolta.
If they are too dear, my current one – fugifilm s5000 is good and the shutter releases immediately – I paid a fortune for it but they are old hat these days so it could be a cheap stop-gap till your kitchen is cheaper. No shutter release facility though – will google that option and get back to you with more wisdom 🙂
I seem to be able to find at least two digital Dynax cameras: Minolta Dynax 7D (650 quid, but possibly discontinued) and Minolta Dynax 5D (450 quid). It seems shutter release cables are available for both these camera. I’m very much tempted by the 5D, I must say, but it’s a lot of money (although peanuts compared to what something like that used to cost). Your Fujifilm camera seems not to exist any more, and I’m not sure what it is closest to now – the S5600?
It seems Minolta have decided to stop making cameras. 🙁 I guess this means that if I don’t buy a Dynax 5D now, I never will. But I guess it’s risky buying an unsupported camera.
I’d go Nikon then, personally. (I like Paul Simon too ;-))
But that means throwing out my old lenses. Reading the press release I linked to above again, it seems Sony has acquired the rights to making cameras with Minolta’s techonology, so perhaps there will soon be a Sony Dynax camera. Possibly worth waiting for?
Phyl would you give some of your older SLR Digitals to a poor Dane?
/Seb
The old ones aren’t digitals.
Ah, bummer, then I don’t think I’ll ask any more for them ,-)
It seems Sony Alpha (which takes Dynax lenses) will be released on Tuesday. That’ll be interesting!
More information here.