Minolta X-700 Aperture Priority Mode | Hacker News Reader

Minolta X-700 Aperture Priority Mode

rokkorfiles.com

24 pointsynac18 comments

1987, the biggest camera in advertisements was the Canon AE-1, it's all I wanted for Christmas. My dad had been shooting a Minolta as far back as he could remember, and he got me a Minolta X-370 instead. At the time I was annoyed, but at least I had a camera.

It's wasn't till later that I realized my dad was absolutely right with this camera. It was more advanced than the AE-1 and I still have it and it still works perfectly. BUT, I found out about the X-700 and picken one up cheap on eBay, it has better flash control than the X-370 and a Program mode which is more advanced than the offerings on the X-370. I now own 2. I occasionally look out for an X-500/570 as what I've read say this is an even better camera, making it the best camera Minolta made prior to switching production to Auto-Focus

If the Minolta X-700 were a car it would be the 1985 Mercedes Benz 300-TD.

The aperture priority setting and flash system worked together like magic. I'd place it in the top 10 cameras of the decade. If it weren't for a couple of plastic parts, it would have been an even bigger deal.

Minolta were ok, occasional leaps of cool tech punctuated by utter nonsense like inserting cards for different modes. Someone mentioned the T90 - superlative camera, multi-spot metering a complete game-changer for anyone using the Zone System and rarely seen again on a camera. Nikon have won the manual camera contest one the basis of the range, quality and longevity of their kit, but cameras are quite personal and little things both annoy and delight us. Many Nikons will poke your eye out with the combined winder/on switch, and each of their cameras has some irritating feature, so it's always nice to hear about other cameras that probably are nicer to use smoothly, even if outgunned on metrics.

Isn't Dynax 7 the most sophisticated electronic SLR ever made, even outperform Nikon F6 or EOS 1N/V?

I'm a little confused by this. A lot of cameras had aperture priority mode in the film days. You set the apeture and the camera would adjust the shutter speed appropriately.

(I had a canon T90 that had it and shot with a borrowed nikon 8008 that had it as well).

The T90 had a spot meter mode where you could use the center circle and tap and extra button (next to the shutter button) to have it average the exposure of all your spots.

http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/classics/cano...

Everything seems easier now that we're digital.

The post title may be a bit misleading here in the sense that the linked article isn't claiming that only the X-700 had aperture priority.

While I can't comment on specifics of the availability of aperture priority in 1980s SLRs, the two models you mention (t90 and n8008) are late 80s models (86 and 88 IIRC) where the X-700 was released in 1981.

The X-700s are terrific cameras, I shot with one for many years.

Aperture priority wasn’t anything new by then, but I think 1981 is early for “P” mode where the camera picks both the f/stop and shutter speed.

Not at all. The Canon A1, born 1978, for example, has shutter priority, aperture priority and full automatic exposure [1]

[1] http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/companies/canon/fdresou...

To my knowledge, Canon was the first to market with a program-mode camera with their A-1 in 1978.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_A-1

It's been a bit more in my model: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30301438

Sorry about that - I only meant to draw attention to it. It's often lauded as the best and the last best in that category.

I've used to own DiMAGE A2 and remember fondly that aperture priority mode was a bit different than in other makers. There was a specified range of shutter times and when the camera was reaching the limit of the range it started changing ISO to stay within the range. It's been extremely useful. I still miss this kind of behavior in my Canon 5D Mark II.

Your Canon should have it. Its called (poorly named to my mind) "Safety Shift" and it changes the iso when your at the edge. Its a custom function.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/22170398

"C. Fn I –8 [Safety shift], is an expanded version of the EOS-1D Mark II N's C. Fn-16 [Safety shift in Av or Tv]. The function [2: Enable (ISO speed)] works in the P, Tv, and Av modes. If subject brightness changes erratically and the correct autoexposure cannot be obtained, the ISO speed is shifted automatically within ISO 100–3200 to obtain a correct exposure. Safety shift overrides the following settings: C. Fn I -3 [Set ISO speed range], C. Fn I -12 [Set shutter speed range], and C. Fn I -13 [Set aperture value range]. During continuous shooting, safety shift might be applied even if flash is used. It depends on the shooting conditions."

The X-700 was my first SLR, and I loved shooting with it. The exposure meter on it was spot on and I don't think until later in the DSLR era I had a camera I could trust as much as I did the Minolta to be right without a light meter.

Me too. Plus that 50mm 1.7 was cheap and awesome.

Mine as well!

I purchased an X-700 a few months ago and the AP mode is as good as it sounds. Program mode is also surprisingly good.

X-500 (essentially the same thing) was my first serious DSLR that started me as a photograph back in the nineties. Such a good camera!

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