3 older 35slr's and have to choose 1! any help?

[andre4999]

My uncle has 3 cameras and I can have one but haven't shot in film for quite a bit and when I did I had an old olympus. Have read good reviews on all of these but never seen or know of a comparison.....any/all feedback would be welcomed, I am a newbie but am familiar with the basics of the older slr's and dissatisfied with digital at my pricepoint.

will be using them for outdoor/landscape exclusively and only black and white film.
THANKS!

canon ae-1
minolta xd-700
mamiya ncs-1000 (or nec1000?)

All work very well and in good shape, if they are all similar...that would be good to know as well. The minolta seems a bit weird with a huge star d-1 zoom that seems to creak where it meets the body? just a tiny bit.

The mamiya has standard oem lens but needs cleaning though in excellent working shape.

the canon comes with 3 lenses but he said the mirror foam may need replacing?

[Xia_Ke]

Hi Andre, welcome to PR All 3 would make nice cameras for getting back into film. The Canon is the only one I have used before and it is a great camera. The Minolta also has an excellent reputation. The Mamiya would probably be the most budget oriented one in that it would be the cheapest to find lenses/accessories for. The Canon would be my pick though, especially since it includes 3 lenses. Don't worry about the mirror foam, should be easy to replace or at least it was a piece of cake in my experience with Olympus and Nikon slr's. There is a guy on Ebay by the handle of interslice who makes excellent seal kits for cheap and has instructions for replacing them on the AE-1's on his website. Honestly though, most any old camera like that is probably going to need to have the seals and foam replaced before use. Hope this helps a little. Keep us posted on which you end up choosing and how it works out for you :thumbsup:

Aaron

[andre4999]

thanks so much aaron, i really appreciate it.
it's so tough knowing what to do in a new (artistic) venue, i liked the canon the best anyway!
if you or anyone needs any info on guitars, mics, mic pres, instrument amps or vintage stereo, feel free to ask.

[andre4999]

also, don't want to be a bugger.....but in the near future I will be wanting to enlarge the b&w photos from the past and soon to be taken....the ones in the past have no negatives so if anyone has any input on where to send orig. prints for this...form reg. 3x4 to anything larger..even slightly larger, much appreciated.
im diving in 100% but cannot/do not have darkroom and really would like to avoid it?!
thanks again

[Greg McCary]

I think you should get a really good flat bed scanner and scan the pictures yourself. Then you can clean them up in PS and print them. If you get a good enough scanner you can scan your own Negs too. I use an Epson V500.

[andre4999]

that makes too much sense!
no really, i never thought of that....being too old school I thought the quality would not work but I am sure things have changed over the last 20 years or so....
good call and thanks much!

[photophorous]

The Canon has a good reputation, but I have not used one myself. I have a Minolta X-700 (or did you mean XD7?) and it's a great camera. It was one of the first to have TTL flash exposure capability, so that would be a big plus if you ever plan to use a flash with it. Minolta lenses are cheap and abundant on the used market, and many of them are fantastic lenses. This may be true for the other two also, but I'm not sure. If the Canon already comes with three lenses, that's a big plus...especially if they are good ones.

This is an excellent website for information on Minolta manual focus gear. http://www.rokkorfiles.com/

Paul