Good morning;
For John Irvine and Wayne Naughton, welcome to the group. Wayne, there are many people who share your interest in Minolta cameras; you are not alone. John, many people like holding a camera that they can feel in their hands. There is also the point that there seems to be an optimum weight for each person that helps in holding the camera steady. Too little weight and you wiggle around more; too much weight and you get tired and your muscles may tremble. There is a balance.
I do admit that Steve's 58 mm f 1.4 comment got my attention. Why do I like the 58 mm f 1.4? I have found that for my eyes, it gives me the same perspective. When I look through the view finder port of the camera I note where things are in the image shown. When I raise my head and look at the scene with my eyes, nothing moves. Everything stays in the same place. If I use a 50 mm lens, when I look up, the things on the sides seem to shift a little further out than they seemed to be when looking through the camera. Try it if you have both focal lengths and see what you get. No, it is not as much of a shift as when using a 35 mm lens, but it is there.
Then there is the point of the f 1.4 instead of f 1.7, f 1.8, or f 2.0. I do find that the viewfinder is brighter, especially in lower light levels, so focusing is easier. Then there is also the shorter depth of field. For me, the difference in the depth of field makes it easier to tell when I have the lens in correct focus.
That is my main collection of reasons why I like the Minolta Auto Rokkor-PF 58 mm f 1.4 and the later incarnations in MC and MD mount variations, and I also admit to having a Nikkkor-S Auto 5.8 cm f 1.4. I have always wondered why both Nikon and Minolta (or Chiyoda Kogaku) chose the focal length of 58 mm when they came out with their first f 1.4 lenses for their SLR cameras.
Finally, yes, I do have two working samples of the Minolta 58 mm f 1.2 lens also. I agree that this lens is noticeably heavier. There is a third sample I keep to show people why you should not store photographic lenses in a garage or basement; the fungus growth in that lens is spectacular. I didn't do it. It was given to me when I offered to buy it as a display piece.
Enjoy; Ralph Javins
