Any SLR's with ~quiet~ motor drives or builtin winders?

darinwc · Jul 4, 2009

Thomas Wilson · Jul 4, 2009

The "C S" (continuous silent) setting on my F5 is incredibly quiet. The gentle slap of the mirror is all one hears.

Damian · Jul 4, 2009

It's a little expensive, but I have a Nikon F6. Overall a quiet (ish) motordrive. It also has a second setting called quiet continious. Which sort changes the pitch of the noise, not really sure if it's actually any quiter though. If you read the bumph nikon put out, they went to great pains to make the drive and the mirror as quite as possible. That's the thing with slr's most of the noise is thought he mirror not the drive as such.

I've played about with Leica's as well. But in absolute terms I still think the Mamiya 7ii is the quietest camera I have ever used. But that's neither an SLR or 35mm.

PhotoJim · Jul 4, 2009

I'm a Nikon guy, but I concede that the Canon EOS A2 / EOS 5 is extremely quiet.

I actually haven't tried silent mode on my Nikon F5 - I will have to now. My F4's "silent" mode isn't that silent, although it is significantly quieter than normal.

Andrew Moxom · Jul 4, 2009

How about Contax RX, or ST?? The RX I had was REALLY quiet.

flatulent1 · Jul 4, 2009

I have a Canon Elan 7N that is nearly silent. Quietest motor-driven camera I've ever (not) heard.

archphoto · Jul 4, 2009

There were a nice couple of spring motor driven RF/PS 35mm camera's way back and even a 126 with a spring motor called the Instamatic 400.

Peter

pesphoto · Jul 5, 2009

konica FS-1

Excalibur2 · Jul 5, 2009

***konica FS-1***

Just got a FT-1 off ebay for peanuts, spares or repair....and it's very noisy when winding on...erm so it's supposed to be very quite..oh well.
I can basically use it but has a strange fault in that you can only take a shot about every 8 secs and that's with new batteries.

djohnfot · Jul 13, 2009

Quiet referenced to what? Compared to an loud old Canon F1 with high speed motor drive or compared to a more modern film camera like a Canon EOS or N series Nikon?

2F/2F · Jul 13, 2009

What situation are you in where you need to shoot with a motor drive *and* do it quietly? You can very easily shoot 1 fps with any old manual SLR advanced by hand.

Ken N · Jul 13, 2009

I use the Olympus MD2 motor drives on my Olympus OM-3Ti/4Ti bodies and find it to be rather quiet. "Back in the day" (late '80s, early '90s), the Olympus kit was considered the quietest pro-level outfit for wildlife work. It's so quick and smooth, it's essentially doing just a "snick" sound.

mudman · Jul 13, 2009

Nikon F100 in Cs is very quiet. The Elan 7ne with the belt drive technology is even more so. Extremely quiet camera.

Colin Corneau · Jul 13, 2009

The quiet mode of the F4 and F5 (I've owned both) are pretty quiet.

It's subjective, of course, but quieter than the normal drive. You may be able to lock up the mirror too (if it's tripod mounted) during exposures to lessen the noise even more.

John_Nikon_F · Jul 13, 2009

The F5 sounds a bit like an F3 that has a weak MD-4 attached, when it's in Cs mode. The F4 is quieter, at least when you're using both bodies in S, Ch, and Cl modes.

-J

Pupfish · Jul 16, 2009

Few fast (5 fps or more) winders are quiet. My old Pentax MX with Motordrive MX shrieked less than my LX with Motordrive LX. (Nicer form factor, too--much like the OM1/2/3/4 series motordrives).

My F5 on CS mode in a blimp is very quiet indeed for a camera with a moving mirror and auto advance. Coreless motors probably have something to do with it.

Later Leica rangefinders also had options for winders, and of course have less mass to move around (no swinging mirror). Can't say about how quiet they are from experience, though.

Jeff Kubach · Jul 16, 2009

All my motordrives are quiet, I just put in my earplugs!

Jeff

timbo10ca · Jul 17, 2009

Canon Elan for sure

Ektagraphic · Jul 17, 2009

I believe that the Canon Elan is very quiet.

DBP · Jul 17, 2009

Just fired the N90, F100, Elan, Robot, and Leningrad. The drives on the N90 and F100 are essentially silent, with the F100 having a slightly quieter shutter. The Elan has a slightly quieter shutter than the F100, but while the motor drive is very quiet, it can be heard. The Robot whined a bit, but that may be a function of being over 60. The Leningrad doesn't whine, but has a quite noticeable thunk at the end of the advance. I think you would be hard pressed to find something much quieter in use than an F100, unless you go to a leaf shuttered rangefinder.

Any SLR's with ~quiet~ motor drives or builtin winders?

Privacy & Transparency

Privacy & Transparency