O/T Photographers...35mm suggestions?

There are some kick *** photographers on here, so I figure this would be a good place to ask this question:

I'm going to be taking a Photography cl*** here at school next semester and I want to keep an eye open for a 35mm manual camera....

What is the best brand and model in the, lets say, $300 - $500 range...or there abouts....probably on the upper end of that figure....

any help would be great.....

 

Dunno, I use a Nikon F3 but that was the top of the line when I got it. And I got it because my old F2s were stolen. Nikon and Canon have always been the pro's pics. I'm not up on any of the newer auto focus computerized things. I just shoot digital now. The point is, if you live near a city with some good camera stores and pawn shops the older stuff will do what you want as long as you don't need autofocus and 40 types of metering toys. Also, since the older lenses aren't compatable with the newer lens mounts they are MUCH cheaper too. You can't hurt a Nikon and it has any lens you'll ever need. The pre-Autofocus is quick too. Push the ****on, 1/4 turn and the lens is off. 1/4 turn and the new lens is on and you're ready to shoot again. Damned good motor drives and autowinders too. But you'll have to have a big city camera store to find lenses or hunt the pawn shops. They don't sell them at walmart or most small town stores. Just places that take trade ins. Go for fast lenses, you'll be glad you did, trust me on this one.

 

I use a Canon AE1 from the 80's or something. My mom gave it to me after she got a new one. Takes awesome pictures.

 

As above....Nikon F3...tho I must say, I have gone over to 'The Dark Side' lately...and now about 95% of the stuff I shoot is Digital.

Use a little Kodak DX3600 for those.

Dave

 

Just sold a good condition 80s AE-1 cannon for a 100.. Thing works perfect, even for a noobie...

I guess digital is in..

 

I used my dad's mid eighties Minolta X-700 when I took photo cl*** in high school. It was very easy to shoot with and gave awesome pics when used with his 16mm fisheye lens. I have seen some real nice looking ones on ebay range from 100 to 300.

 

Nikon, Canon, Minolta -all good choices. Get the one you can afford. Whichever you choose, make sure you get the brand name lens. None of that TokinaVivitarOffbrand ****. Gl*** is everything.

 

Thanks guys....if I dig up enough cash, what extra lenses should I pick up...?

 

Do not overlook Ebay. I've bought several 35mm items and I had some very nice deals on a few items. They also have supplies and a lot of collector and vintage cameras if you wanted to shoot old-school style. They all basically do the same thing...

I would suggest a 15 or 28mm "fish eye" for distortion and pulling a lot of area into a shot (like the inside of a car) with the rest of your equipment.

Poke around ebay and get a feel for prices and read the descrptions of stuff.

 

Good advice on secondhand cameras and high quality 'name' gl*** lenses. With the right lense, you can take great photos using a wooden box as the body of your camera.

Usually the camera store that look after the pros will have a good range of second hand gear and you can usually pick up a bargain on a later model used pro model.

As for lenses, fisheye is good to have but limited use unless you want all your pics distorted and out of proportion. To keep the number of lenses down, a couple of multi focal units would probably be best. Say, something like a 28-80mm backed up by an 80-100 or 80-300mm unit.

There's some pretty slick little digitals out there but I still prefer to use film and my EOS1 and with my ****py eyesight, the autofocus feature is a boon. On the other hand the little 4mp Panasonic gizmo I have takes a pretty nice picture, just doesn't work or feel like a real camera. Kinda like having a fibregl*** Deuce Highboy as opposed to steel.

These were shot on real film....

 

With the advances in digital photography hitting thier stride in the last year or so, 35mm prices have come way down. Check out E bay or your local camera stores for some great deals.. I shoot Nikon, but Canon is equally as good. Theres a local wedding photographer that just sold all of his medium format because he feels film is dead. I don't think so. I bought one of his Mamiya 645 cameras with a metered finder and two lenses (150mm and 80mm) all for 200 bucks! ****A!!!

At any rate, I think a Nikon FM or FM2 would be a great camera for you. Or even an old F2 or F2AS Photomic, those cameras NEVER die!

Spike

 

Been shooting with a Pentax K-1000 for almost twenty years and love it. Like they said before, invest in good quality lenses.

 

Well I looked on Ebay and found several Nikon FM2 bodies on there ranging from around 100 - 250...sounds like a pretty good price to me....

Are the lenses for this body still avalable from the Nikon or will I have to search for used ones?

 

Any comments on the Nikon FM10?.....looks like it might be their cheap *** camera...so i dont think it would be that great but it looks like it is only 200 or so brand new....

 

When I was heavy into the stuff I used Nikon (A2), I sold it a long time ago for good money. I like Nikon so much when I bought a good digi I went with Nikon Cool Pix 5700...
but back to 35mm.

*edit, now that I think of it A2 dont sound right...I can't remember what model that was...it did everything for you...multi shots and multi exposures, auto everything...was billed as the best when new and to be honest too much camera for me...I sold it for what I had in it a year or so later...ah well...the Chinon I am right about...I just pulled it out.**


My back up camera was 100% manual and with a good lense it often surp***ed my expensive stuff...I still have it and it is still a good little unit that costs next to nothing if you can find it...a Chinon CM-7. I use a second hand Tokina lens on it and that bad boy works great.

Just my .02

 

I use a Cannon RebelG. Manual is optional, but I have never used any of the auto features, so I don't even know if they work.
Its pretty hard to find a decent full manual camera new and affordable.
Avoid the Rebel 2000 they are junk.
I shot this one with the cannon.

 

I am really bad aboout recycling (as in re-selling) my old gear when I buy new gear (every year on the advise of my tax guy). I still have a Canon AE-1 Program body in my office. The lens that it is on it is **** (couldn't find the body cap so I just stuck an old lense on it). It works great, I used it to shoot many-a-feature for Truckin' back in the day. It has both manual and automatic exposure modes and is really simple to use.

Tell you what, in the spirit if the HAMB, make a $75 donation to the HAMB and it is yours. As soon as I get confirmation from Ryan that he got the money/check/money order/pay pal payment, I'll ship it to you. Sound like a deal? Hell, I'll throw in an extra 50mm Canon lense and whatever else I can dig up that fits the camera...

 

I've used a Canon AL-1 for about 20 years now and have had great luck with it.The AL-1 is different from the AE-1 in that instead of a split image focus(which my eyes have trouble with)it uses a 3 dot system(left and right red arrows to indicate the direction to turn to focus and a green center dot when focused).I bought the body for $56 new and spent nearly $300 on a 35-105mm Macro Zoom Canon lens(very versatile)which has a gear drive focus rather than a slide and has yet to fail.The only problem I've ever had with it is the ****ing lever kept loosening up(Loc***e to the rescue)and the plastic clip on the battery cover broke(a custom bracket fixed that).Quick lens interchange(if you have additional lenses).I also have a digital(Sony FD Mavica)but still prefer the Canon.

 

OGNC,

Check your PM

 

speaking as a fairly ****py photographer, but a guy who can develop all the 35mm in the world for free (mum owns a pharmacy with a phto department where i used to work), i cannot see the point for someone who wants to LEARN photography, using 35mm.

i know, there are some drawbacks to digital that i won't bother discussing, but they are fairly minimal these days, and only the really serious (arty) guys would worry about it.

digital has one huge advantage... the number of shots you take. bradberry, you're a good artist, how good would you be if you drew once a week? or once a month? ****HOUSE! you draw all the time, and you get better at it.

i used to have a Canon EOS 500 with a 28-200 tamron lens. the camera was good, the lens less so, but i think i took about 1000 photo's in the time i owned that camera... tops. i printed this stuff for FREE, remember. i had that camera about two years. about 18 months ago i bought a digital (a fuji S602, which is no longer a fantastic buy but was pretty good at the time) and have since taken EIGHT THOUSAND photos.

the results are instantaneous. you can **** with under and overexposing. you can **** with aperture and shutter speeds to get different depths of field, and you see the result IMMEDIATELY, and knowing exactly what you just did. and if you forget, all cameras store in EXIF JPEG format that allows you to find out exactly what settings you had it on for a particular shot.

my mum is getting rid of the photo department in the shop once the developing machine reaches the end of its life. film is dead, economically speaking. (and yes, there are artists and traditionalists that will continue to use it, and good on them)...

buy a digital.

 

The reason you would want to learn photography on a film camera is the same reason you learn to draw with a pencil first, and not a computer. You need to learn the basics. Even though the media has changed, the principles remain the same. Get the FM2 and you won't be disapointed. Although, a real magazine guy's camera may be worth more someday..

Spike

 

Computers **** for art, simple as that.....

Computers are for the HAMB, typing papers, internet, and maybe tweaking artwork....

There is no way you can replace a good oil painting with an ugly digital painting. And I think the same of photography, digital cameras are for taking pictures at a car show (when you arent getting artistic), family reunons, or a birthday party....you get my point...

digital anything is CHEATING!

 

[ QUOTE ]
Computers **** for art, simple as that.....

...
There is no way you can replace a good oil painting with an ugly digital painting. ...
digital anything is CHEATING!



[/ QUOTE ]


Reactionary....

 

wouldn't all of us on this board be reactionaries?

in the sense that all of us choose old un-"progressed" vehicles over their newer "progressed" counterparts....

most of us like simplicity, most of us are anti modern in the form of street rods, 350's, and billet aluminum....

I just happen to think that computers are slowly taking away talent and making everyone an "artist" instead of the gifted few....

look at a 15th century master painting next to a 21st century "master file"....

I appreciate digital artwork, i just prefer a piece in which I can see the brushstrokes and the steps in which it was made.....instead of pixels...

just my thinking.....

 

ok, i found a camera body on ebay that i am eyeballing.....no lenses included though....

so as far as lenses go...what ones would be the best basic lenses....I only have enough cash for one or two of them for starters....what ones would you recommend spending my hard earned money on?....

Thanks for all the help so far....and sorry for the rant earlier on digital artwork....if i offended anyone in my thinking im sorry........

 

I guess it doesn't matter what camera that you use, it's how you use it....

 

[ QUOTE ]
The reason you would want to learn photography on a film camera is the same reason you learn to draw with a pencil first, and not a computer. You need to learn the basics. Even though the media has changed, the principles remain the same.

[/ QUOTE ]

it's funny how two people can take the same argument and use it and use it to justify two utterly opposed points of view. the very fact that "the principles remain the same" is WHY i think digitals are a better first camera, these days. the principles of photography are identical, but a digital allows you to explore the boundaries so much faster, and cheaper.


my brother, a photography nut, recently bought a Canon 300D, i think it is, a digital SLR. and about two weeks after he bought it, it was in for repairs. i said "****, a camera that cost that much and it's in for repairs?"

basically, his response was that, given the nature of digital photography (the in***ial outlay is greater, the cost per shots after that sinks to near-zero) camera manufacturers are making many more repairs to new cameras. there are tests you can set out (which work for both 35mm and digital stuff) which, by taking 60 shots, can really test the focusing capabilites of the camera. so basically everyone with a digital reads about these tests on the net, and does them. if their camera "fails", they get it fixed. with 35mm, how many amateurs would sit down and blow two or three rolls of film to find out if the camera they'd purchased was *slightly* amiss... from the experience in our shop: none.


my point is that, given that it's so much cheaper to experiment with digital photography, the amateur gets better, faster. and because the principles are the same, the skills you learn on a digital can be transferred (with some tweaking) to a 35mm.

[ QUOTE ]
Computers **** for art, simple as that.....


[/ QUOTE ]

look at some of kojack's work and tell me that again. i'm sorry, but that's just being traditional for the sake of it.

i've got no problem with you buying a 35mm, they've worked for the whole world for the last 50 years or whatever, and they'll work for you.

i just think you're hindering you're own progress, that's all.

good luck with it. be sure to post on the art show too!

 

I used a Canon EOS Rebel until I went digital. Good all around workhorse that took a beating and still took great photos.

Pentax K-1000 is the best low-end all around shooter ever made. I know a lot of pros that never leave home without one, and I was pissed when mine got stolen.

Can't go wrong with Nikon at any level.

If you want to get real serious, get a Holga

The only real difference between digital and traditional is now the magic happens in the camera, not the darkroom. There's more to it than that, but digital accomplishes everything I need. I'm not a pro, but my shots do appear in print regularly.

Check out Brush's artwork and tell me again why no real artist ever created anything worthwhile on a computer.

Look under Paintings: Digital and check out the John Mayer and Jon Stewart paintings.

http://www.jeffnorwell.com

Cameras, like computers, brushes, chisels and welders, are just tools. It's what you do with them that matters.

 

OGNC
That's a good deal on the AE-1. I had one before my Rebel and loved it. It had a better feel to it than my newer cannon.
I've shot a bunch of cameras over the years and still think you can't beat a cannon. They just take a beatin and keep commin back for more.

 

most of you took my point on digital artwork the wrong way....

I just prefer traditional medium...Brush's work is amazing I will agree with that.....but ask him if he wants to work digital or if he has to....i bet he has to....

And the fact is I have to learn film photography, it is required by my school and I enjoy it...

If you like digital artwork good for you...dont tell me I can't...I prefer a traditional mediums.....but I do own about every digital imaging program ever made and use them as well.