Newbie looking for advice

Wallendo · Sep 28, 2016

The Minolta camera mentioned by the OP is not a bad camera. It can be shot automatically, or completely manually. The only downside is that it uses a 2CR5 battery which, although widely available, tends to be a little pricey ... about $9-10.

JamesNixon · Sep 28, 2016

Nessy said:
Apart from that any reading material you might suggest would be great or advice on where in London is the best to buy materials/develop film!

Nessy

If you're in commuting distance of Hackney, there's a darkroom at the London Hackspace where you'll be able to develop your own black and white film.
https://wiki.london.hackspace.org.uk/view/Group:Darkroom

Also, if you want to have a shop around for a camera, check out the Portabello Road Market on a Saturday. There's 5 or so vendors who sell film cameras.

Andrew O'Neill · Sep 28, 2016

Welcome, Nessy!

Alan Gales · Sep 28, 2016

Leigh B said:
In my 56+ years of shooting, I don't remember using the DoF preview even once, although most of my cameras had it.

- Leigh

+1

Alan Gales · Sep 28, 2016

We enjoy arguing on here about 35mm cameras and lenses but to be honest, they were for the most part pretty much all good. A Minolta is fine as are Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Olympus, etcetera. Contax and Leica are too but they are pricey. If you find your 35mm lenses not sharp enough then you need to move up to medium format.

Just get a camera that you can adjust both lens aperture and shutter speed. A program camera with autofocus and auto film advance is fine just as long as you set your exposure manually and skip using the aperture preferred, shutter preferred and program modes while learning.

I would look for something affordable that you can readily find lenses for in your country. Welcome to APUG.

Jim Blomfield · Sep 28, 2016

Hi Nessy,

I have several Minolta Dynax 500si Super bodies, have used them for many years and have found them to be very reliable. Minolta lenses are excellent quality. I only use these cameras on manual mode and actually use a hand held meter instead of the camera's meter so that I have more control over what I am doing. If you can find a good quality body and lenses at a reasonable price, I do not think you will go wrong.

Sirius Glass · Sep 29, 2016

Welcome to APUG

For decades used Minolta SLRs, then I move to Nikon SLRs and now I use Hasselblads.

Alan Gales · Sep 29, 2016

Sirius Glass said:
Welcome to APUG

For decades used Minolta SLRs, then I move to Nikon SLRs and now I use Hasselblads.

Hey Sirius! I saw a Forbes article today on the new Hasselblad mirrorless digital camera. They showed three iconic images produced with Hasselblads in the article. The famous Jimi Hendrix photo, the David Bowie Diamond Dogs photo and an Apollo shot of the earth. All three film images!!!

I thought you might get a kick out of hearing that.

Sirius Glass · Sep 30, 2016

Thanx!!

Newbie looking for advice

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