Best classic camera?

[summitar]

I love the workmanship of the better classic cameras. I also enjoy reading

reviews of the camera, especially the ones from oldtimer cameras.

 

I came upon a review that is a bit over the top. I will quote several paragraphs

but delay naming the camera to give you all a chance to ponder the make and model.

 

"For those of you who turn straight away to the final paragraph of a test report

for the camera's performance. we've fooled you by putting it here! This camera

is such a good camera, I haven't met anyone yet who, after seeing and handling

the camera, hasn't said, "I want one."

The camera is so good, it's not only the best camera I've ever seen, it's simply

the best current 35mm camera. And what's more, it's a very good value for the money.

Handling this camera is like handling no other. It's very comfortable to hold

and the controls fall readily to hand. Winding on is quick and smooth; rewinding

is equally so."

 

The above is from a magazine that performs quite comprehensive reviews.

 

Now what camera could this be...

[dan_fromm2]

It can't be anything but a Miranda. Unless its an Exakta. Unless its a Zenit.

[Andy Collins]

That depends on the day and my mood after using whichever camera I've chosen for that day! Today that could refer to my Canon G-III QL17, tomorrow, who knows...

[leicaglow]

I was going to guess a Leica R series until it said "a very good value for the money." I almost think I remember reading this, or something like it, and thinking, yeah, but it's too small for my hands. I think that was an Olympus OM-1. But I don't remember what one feels like.

[don_e]

Sounds like a Pentax Spotmatic ad "Handling this camera is like handling no other. It's very comfortable to hold and the controls fall readily to hand."

[patrick j dempsey]

Well, it at least sounds like an OM1.... but who knows, it could be a review of an Argus C3... written by someone who works for Argus... hehehehe.

[JDMvW]

What could it be but a Kiev 4, even though it didn't mention the grinding sounds on advance and the odd smell?

[summitar]

The review was written by Allan Shriver and appeared in the Nov 30 1977 issue of Amateur Photographer. The review was about 5 pages long. The camera is a Minolta XD11 (XD7 in the UK). David Williams wrote a followup review that appeared in the Jan 2 1982 issue of the same magazine and asked the question if the XD11 was still competitive with more recent multi-mode cameras. The answer was yes. I own silver and black versions of the camera and they are among my favorites.

 

I pondered how to handle the issue that the XD11 doesn't fit the pre-1970 criterion, but fits my personal criterion of being over 30 years old. I decided that I didn't want to give any hints that would affect your selection.

[leicaglow]

It was certainly a handsome camera, but it seems that someone would have to have been paid off to write a review like that.

[tony_lockerbie]

Hi Kerry, I was going to ask from what period? But you have answered that and then I though of three cameras, OM1, Pentax SP and the Minolta XE1.

 

The guy might have received a pay check from Minolta but if it is the same as my XE1 then I can imagine his enthusiasm.

 

They are very handsome cameras and would have the best feeling film advance of any camera, bar none. Except maybe for the Leica R3, which is much the same, and yes, the Kiev! No, not really the Kiev.

 

Tony

[gatorgums]

I believe it to be a Leica of some vintage, or perhaps maybe an Alpa SLR.

It could also be one of the better Kodak cameras.

[gatorgums]

No, on second thought l think it was a Minolta! hahahahah

[peter_naylor1]

The older I get, the more suspicious I get about any so-called objective reports anywhere on anything that are produced by the commercial media, whether it's a magazine like the Brit AP or a newspaper or TV news. There are just too many pressures from advertisers for this not to be so.

 

A good example would be McDonald's, who apparently only place their extensive advertising for their plastic hambergers with media concerns who agree in writing not to write anything defamatory. So basically when Mrs Bloggs finds a dead cockroach in her kd's Big Mac, it's not going to make the 6 O'clock News on Channel Whatever, is it?

 

Another example would be test reports on this or that new vehicle, which is invariably written up in the car mags as the "Best Ever". Oh, yeah? A well-respected motoring journalist for the ABC here in Oz once gave a mediocre report on the latest Mercedes sedan. OK, so the ABC is a national non-commercial media organisation and doesn't have advertising pressures, so they can tell things as they are. This journalist gave the unsurprising news recently that he's now barred from attending any more new vehicle launch spectaculars by that same Mercedes concern. I wonder why?

 

OK, so I'm digressing a bit so back to the central theme of objective journalism vs. commercial pressures. I was recently going through the "New Goods" section of a late 40s BJP Almanac, and found a glowing write-up on that "new" British MF folder, the Agilux Agifold. It included all sorts of glowing praise like how nice it looked, how easy it was to use, etc, etc. What?? It's an ugly duckling in anybody's language, and I'm an Agilux collector. Strangely, a later report in a mid-50s BJPA on the Series 111 Agifold - which by now was actually a nice-looking, more compact camera - mentioned something about its looks not being to everybody's taste.

 

The only logical assumption I can draw from this is that the cosy deal between the BJPA's editorial management and AGI/Agilux had worn thin between 1949 and 1956, but you still have to wonder about the Big Picture don't you? Can any commercial (ie, one that accepts advertising) publication whether in print or electronic ever be 100% objective. I don't think so, so Kerry's revelation about the Minolta getting such a rave review back then is hardly a surprise. I wouldn't be surprised if there are similar rave reviews about the Miranda DX-3 in other magazines, and we Mirandaholics all know what a dog that one turned out to be ..... (Pete In Perth)

[Brian]

<P>People have questioned the impartiality of that review, but I own an XD-7 and he's right. No other 35mm camera that I own feels so good or works so smoothly. Why it didn't take the world by storm I'll never know.</P> <P> PS JDM, great comment about the Kiev 4. I've got one just like that.</P>

[Richard Williams]

I don't know about the BJP in the 40s (maybe just about any decent camera it was actually possible to get hold of in Austerity Britain would have gotten glowing reviews!), but I'd be a bit surprised if AP reviewers in the 70s/80s were unduly influenced by their advertisers (most of whom have always been camera shops rather than manufacturers). My guess would be an opinionated reviewer (there's never been a shortage of these!), perhaps with a weakness for new 'features', enthusing over a camera he genuinely liked.

[luis triguez]

I quite agree with Peter.

 

Anyway, if I have to choose, based in my own experiences. The hardest nut to crack and better companion for all the life is the Nikon F.

[peter_naylor1]

Hi, Richard I take your point about Britain of the late 40s being a place of austerity, having been born there in 1947 and witnessed it personally, cod-liver oil and all However, there always has been a certain amount of skulduggery going on with the editorial leanings of the BJP Almanac, irrespective of the frugality imposed post-WW2 by the Atlee Government. For example, going back much earlier to even pre-WW1 days there's evidence that Dallmeyer Ltd got better reviews than their rivals Ross and Taylor-Taylor-Hobson amongst the main British optical companies. However, whether that had anything to do with the respective amount of advertising space paid for, I don't know.

 

Getting back to the Agilux Agifold thing and the change of manner in describing the original 1949 model compared to the "new" model in 1957, I've posted a pic here of the two of 'em side by side. Although Beauty Is In The Eye Of The Beholder, the later model wins hands down for me in every respect.

 

Let's look first at the 1949 model. It cost GBP 11-10-0d without PT for the better 8-speed model (1 - 1/150 sec) and was described as "embodies many refinements not usually found at so reasonable a price", "neat, lightweight body", "carefully designed, well-balanced and easy to hold", "all controls readily accessable" and "of sound construction and particularly pleasing appearance".

 

Now let's look what they had to say in 1957 about the new model, which cost GBP 14-0-6d without PT and had a 9-speed shutter (1 - 1/350 sec), uncoupled rangefinder, extinction meter and a lot more chrome - it could also take a single-shot plate back. Now it was described as: "styling perhaps not to everyone's choice", "controls awkwardly placed", "shutter militates against rapid working" and "shutter wound by a small lever inacessably placed."

 

Apart from the cosmetic changes and the better shutter, the lens was still an f4.5 3-element coated triplet made by Agilux themselves. They also made their own shutters and that cocking lever that got the criticism in 1957 was in exactly the same place as it had been for the 1949 model, so go figure just how it was "readily accessable" in 1949 but "inaccessably placed" in 1957, eh?

 

Mate, as an Agilux collector I'm not knocking these cameras, just the BJPA journalistic largesse that took such a turnabout in barely 8 years. Many of those criticisms in 1957 are indeed justified. The 1957 Agifold could have been a much better camera (say, with an f3.5 4-element lens and combined film wind/shutter cocking) but it would have cost more. Anyway, have a look at the pic and compare starters, eh? (Pete In Perth)<div></div>

[john_smullen]

The description could be applied to several cameras issued in the past 8 decades! I could see it applied to one of the early Kodak Retina cameras.

[tim_huggins]

"It's very comfortable to hold and the controls fall readily to hand."

 

Hmmm, I guess that means the shutter speed setting was around the lens mount --> where god (and Mr.Yoshihisa Maintani) intended it to be!

[dan_fromm2]

Tim, Nikon had put the shutter speed around the lens mount long before Maitani started designing full frame 35 mm SLRs. Nikkormat. Give credit to the inventor, not the imitator.

[red_buckner]

I have a house full of vintage cameras, and several new ones. When I go out shooting, I usually pick up my XD-11. It has the best ergonomics of any camera I've picked up, and it does everything smoothly and well. This is a 1977 machine, never overhauled, and it does the job every time. Each time I get new cameras, I expect them to replace the Minolta as my default machine. They never do.

[tim_huggins]

Mr. Fromm, Mr. Maintani was the most innovative and creative camera designer who has ever lived. No one has come close to matching his accomplishments. While he certainly improved on previous ideas, he never imitated!

 

"If you canﾒt make something original, better not to make it at all. A camera maker that simply copies others has no right to call itself a maker in the first place."

- Y. Maintani

[dan_fromm2]

Tim, what you say may be true BUT the Nikkormat antedates the OM. I repeat, as far as control layout goes, the OM has nothing new. And if you think hard about what it takes to make a 35 mm SLR really useful, you'll find that the bright people who invented the Nikon F solved all of the problems first.

 

Who, if not Maitani, designed Olympus first 35 mm SLRs? These were cut price Pentax clones.

[allan_shriver]

<p>Yes, folks, I <strong>AM </strong> <em>that </em> Allan Shriver, former Technical Editor (and eventual Editor-in-Chief during its centenary year in 1984) of said <em>Amateur Photographer </em> magazine, then the UK's largest-selling weekly photographic journal of the 1970s and 80s (and possibly beyond, for awhile).<br>

AND I <strong><em>can </em> </strong> assure everyone here that I did <em>not </em> take (then or ever) any inducement to write a good review <strong>and </strong> at <em>no time</em> did AP ever do so during my roughly 10-year stint on the editorial staff. In fact, such was AP's editorial independence, that it is a well-known fact that the then importer/distributor of Canon (J J Silber) <strong>pulled out ALL </strong> of its advertising from AP for several weeks after I wrote (and AP published) a damning review of (I think it was...) the fully-auto Canon T50 SLR.<br>

Yes, many ads were dealer ads, but the big glossy profitable expensive ads were paid for by distributors, before the manufacturers settled their own companies in the UK under their own names. I was under <strong>MORE</strong> pressure from the publisher ('publisher' and NOT the editor) to retract (or 'soften') what I'd said, than we were from the distributor!!<br>

I am pleased to see here that some of the respondants here endorse my enthusiasm for the then new Minolta XD series SLRs. Yes, many of the SLRs then were getting smaller and lighter (some were in fact getting almost TOO small!*) and more ergonomically designed and this XD Minolta WAS one of the best at the time and such a joy to use. It was very difficult NOT to get so enthused about such a thoughtfully designed camera that performed so well and felt so 'natural'.<br>

* Do any of you remember the teeny weeny little Minolta 110 Zoom SLR that used 110-format film cassettes?! Idiosyncratic fun though! :o)<br>

Yes, there were other excellent diminutive 35mm SLRs about that time, such as the delightful Olympus OM series, as just one example, as some of you have stated. So many manufacturers were (perhaps a bit oddly) SO close to each others' designs with smaller 35mm SLRs then.<br>

I even remember how I got my hands on this XD series Minolta SLR. The distributor was in the Midlands and AP was in Sutton Surrey. I agreed on the phone at about 7pm - yes I was working late (again, since I LOVED that job) that I would drive about half-way up the M1 and the PR/marketing man would drive half-way down the M1 and we met at a service area, had a coffee and he handed over the camera for reviewing. I wanted AP to be the first to review it, so I went the extra mile/s.<br>

I had a wonderfully professional and innovative editor then (Martin Hodder) who gave me a relatively free hand to do whatever was necessary to keep AP's technical reputation as high as possible, whatever the cost (see above note about unintentionally upsetting Canon and the consequence for our publisher!).<br>

I now forget the exact sequence of the launching of cameras at that time, but at one point I sourced my own personal Canon A-1 SLR from a dealer in Chicago during a photo fair there, since they were not yet available in the UK. (Note: they were NOT grey imports!, but consumer purchases whilst abroad on a working holiday!) There were many fine SLRs then and since.<br>

<strong>TO ALL: </strong><br>

The '<em>right</em> ' camera for '<em>you</em> ' is whichever one feels natural to you. Yes, reviews are quite personal, but I like to think that we gave as much unbiased facts as possible also, but since I was in the very enjoyable, very privileged and very responsible position of handling most every SLR launched between about 1977 and 1980 as Technical Editor of AP, I could only pass on my 'considered' opinion. As your skill grows, then the 'right' camera for you may well change!<br>

We on AP gave not only the statistical test results (shutter speed accuracy and lens resolution, for example) but also the very important 'feel' impressions. But the best camera for anyone is the one that gives that person the best result and the best personal feeling of enjoyment. One can never really fully separate the facts from the feel of one's enjoyment of photography or other hobbies. I still enjoy photography, both with my 'conventional' (film) cameras, and digital photography. <br>

Good shooting to you all, All The Best, Allan Shriver</p>

[allan_shriver]

<p>Actually, the tiny SLR I was thinking about was, in fact, the Pentax Auto 110 (see it on a wikipedia.com search).<br>

Cheers,<br>

Allan</p>