First steps back to film photography after a long hiatus: handling of the Minolta X570

Hi,

I recently purchased the Minolta X570, so getting back to film photography, and here are my first impressions. So far so good.

First steps back to film photography after a long hiatus: handling of the Minolta X570

The last time I shot film was in 2001 with a Konica Autoreflex T3 in Houston, TX. Since then, I exclusively shot digital: former gear: Nikon D70 > D200 > D300s > left Nikon camp > Sony a850 + a900 > left Sony camp > current gear: Canon 6D and 5DIV, Fuji X100T. Quite recently, I have got my hands on the Minolta X570 + Rokkor 50 mm f/1.7 (the condition is “used-like new” for the lens, the body in very good conditions as well). To be honest, I could not be happier with this choice. Herein are my first impressions:

The camera was designed and sold in 1983, and was a “downgraded” version of the more famous Minolta X700 model. The X570 is however all what you wish for an analogue camera, and I will explain why:

• The camera package is both light and small without compromising some important features. In a few words, superb portability! Its dimensions (without the lens) are comparable to the Fuji X100 series. The built quality is excellent, and albeit being mostly made of (good quality) plastic, the camera feels durable and sturdy. In contrast, the bottom part of the camera is made of metal. The ergonomics are great too and the camera fits well in my hands. Overall, the features-to-size factor ratio is quite excellent.
• The viewfinder is bright and HUGE! It has 95% coverage and has a 0.9x effective magnification, a real pleasure to look through it. No modern full frame dSLRs have such large viewfinders. As today, the largest dSLR viewfinder (for Full Frame cameras) has just 0.76x effective magnification (with 100% coverage though).
• One great feature is its Aperture Priority mode (A, my favorite mode), which makes the analogue experience more responsive that any fully manual cameras. If you are into film journalism, probably a must have feature! Focus manually, select the aperture you want, then the camera will select the shutter speed (max shutter speed 1/1000s, so if you shoot with fast lenses at f/1.2-1.4, choose low sensitivity speed films, ISO 64 or lower) based on your targeted subject, and then you are ready to capture the frame. This mode works surprisingly well as the camera is equipped with a very accurate center-weighted light metering system. I recently shot my first roll (Portra 400, which is very forgiving as the film has great latitude), all 36 exposures turned out to be well exposed. None were overexposed or underexposed. Truly excellent, and that’s a big selling point as far as I am concerned. Unlike the X700, the camera has no P mode (Program), which is not necessarily a big loss.
• If you want to shoot in M mode (manual), you can. The camera is actually smarter than the X700 as the viewfinder indicates both the current shutter speed (one LED) and the suggested shutter speed (another LED). The X700 just shows you the suggested shutter speed, so you must be sure to look at the shutter speed dial before clicking the shutter button (which means you must look away from the viewfinder = less efficient). With the X570, you can match both current and suggested shutter speeds without having to get your sight away from the viewfinder. Brilliant!
• The camera is also equipped with a dedicated depth of field preview (located on the bottom front left side of the camera) and an automatic exposure lock (AEL, located on the front side of the camera) buttons. While I barely use the former (it can be useful though), the latter is very useful for reframing your subject right after the camera calculates the correct exposure (e., shutter speed in A mode). While activated, the AEL button will lock the exposure to your initial target (e.g., exposure locked on faces for portraits).
• The camera tackles ISO 12-3200 film speeds, i.e., the light meter will know which exposure to choose based on the specified ISO setting.
• One issue some people may have is the camera does not work without battery. In that sense, the shutter is electronically controlled, so it is probably best to have a spare battery (2 x S76/LR44/SR44/EPX-76 1.5v or 1x CR-1/3N 3v). Just turn off your camera when you are not using it, and you will be fine. One benefit though is when the camera is off, there is no way you can accidently push the shutter button.

Congratulations, IMHO the X-500/570 is the best manual focus Minolta ever produced.

Also the TTL-flash functionality is very nice.

A quite nice review can be seen here: http://www.rokkorfiles.com/X-570.htm

Actually I own one since the early 1980's when it was introduced. Meanwhile I have some spare copies as well.

ThomasB wrote:

Congratulations, IMHO the X-500/570 is the best manual focus Minolta ever produced.

I am not familiar with the other models but based on what I read on the internet, I chose the X570 over the X700 (actually based on the link you provided below).

I am very happy with the results thus far. Sadly, I am not able to scan my own negatives yet (I just ordered a scanner), but hopefully by the end of the week.

Here are some (poor jpg quality though):

Cheers,

Max

Also the TTL-flash functionality is very nice.

A quite nice review can be seen here: http://www.rokkorfiles.com/X-570.htm

Excellent link!

Actually I own one since the early 1980's when it was introduced. Meanwhile I have some spare copies as well.

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Regards, Thomas Bernardy
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Here is the write up on my website:

http://www.maximesiegler.com/minolta-x570/

I will add some photos once I am able to scan the negative!  Should be soon.

Cheers,

Max

moimoi wrote:

I will add some photos once I am able to scan the negative! Should be soon.

Just out of curiosity: Which scanner did you buy?

ThomasB wrote:

moimoi wrote:

I will add some photos once I am able to scan the negative! Should be soon.

Just out of curiosity: Which scanner did you buy?

Plustek OpticFilm 8200i Ai Film Scanner (dedicated to 35 mm only though)

http://plustek.com/usa/products/film-and-photo-scanners/

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Regards, Thomas Bernardy
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Hi,

Here is a link in which I added a few scans from Roll #1 (Portra 400).

http://www.maximesiegler.com/roll-1-x570/

Cheers,

Max

moimoi wrote:

Hi,

Here is a link in which I added a few scans from Roll #1 (Portra 400).

http://www.maximesiegler.com/roll-1-x570/

Cheers,

Max

Excellent results. I'm particularly surprised about the Portra 400. Maybe I'll try it as well. Generally I prefer to use Fujifilm as the first choice.

Do you like your new scanner? At which resolution did you scan?

ThomasB wrote:

moimoi wrote:

Hi,

Here is a link in which I added a few scans from Roll #1 (Portra 400).

http://www.maximesiegler.com/roll-1-x570/

Cheers,

Max

Excellent results. I'm particularly surprised about the Portra 400. Maybe I'll try it as well. Generally I prefer to use Fujifilm as the first choice.

Yes, it is an excellent film if you shoot portrait.

Do you like your new scanner? At which resolution did you scan?

Yes, I do like it. For my first roll, the frames were scanned at 3600ppi. The scanner can go at 7200ppi but there seems no major gain of resolution with the latter (at least with Portra 400).

Maybe for the next roll, I will do more testing and do the 7200ppi > 3600ppi conversion.

Here is a full scan:

Cheers,

Max

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Regards, Thomas Bernardy
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moimoi wrote:

ThomasB wrote:

moimoi wrote:

Hi,

Here is a link in which I added a few scans from Roll #1 (Portra 400).

http://www.maximesiegler.com/roll-1-x570/

Cheers,

Max

Excellent results. I'm particularly surprised about the Portra 400. Maybe I'll try it as well. Generally I prefer to use Fujifilm as the first choice.

Yes, it is an excellent film if you shoot portrait.

Do you like your new scanner? At which resolution did you scan?

Yes, I do like it. For my first roll, the frames were scanned at 3600ppi. The scanner can go at 7200ppi but there seems no major gain of resolution with the latter (at least with Portra 400).

Maybe for the next roll, I will do more testing and do the 7200ppi > 3600ppi conversion.

I think 7200 dpi is a bit of a overkill for color film. I have still an old Minolta "Dimage Scan Elite 5400" and already 5400 dpi is too much as that results already in a 40 MP picture out of a 24x36 mm negative. Even the best color film gets grainy already in that resolution and the scan times are much longer as well. Therefore it's IMHO waste of time and effort to scan at resolutions higher than 4000 dpi.

ThomasB wrote:

I think 7200 dpi is a bit of a overkill for color film. I have still an old Minolta "Dimage Scan Elite 5400" and already 5400 dpi is too much as that results already in a 40 MP picture out of a 24x36 mm negative. Even the best color film gets grainy already in that resolution and the scan times are much longer as well. Therefore it's IMHO waste of time and effort to scan at resolutions higher than 4000 dpi.

I would agree with you. I think I will spend most of my time scanning at 3600ppi with the Plustek. Do you think it does a reasonable job based on the provided sample?

Cheers,

Max

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Regards, Thomas Bernardy
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sybersitizen wrote:

A general suggestion is to scan at the actual hardware resolution of the scanner. Then, downsample the resulting file to whatever resolution you want to permanently keep. Scans will take longer, but sometimes it offers an improvement over scanning directly at the lower resolution. You'd have to try it and see if it's worthwhile for you.

Indeed, I will try this on the second roll.  I tries on some frames from the first roll, but see no significant improvement.    However, the grain of Portra 400 might be too large to resolve such details!

Cheers,

Max

moimoi wrote:

Do you think it does a reasonable job based on the provided sample?

IMHO the presented scan quality is more than sufficient. Nothing to complain about.

To really check the max. possible quality of the scanner I would recommend to use a high resolution B&W film, shoot with a capable lens at it's best aperture (usually something like F5.6 for 50mm "normal" lenses) and scan at max. resolution.

ThomasB wrote:

moimoi wrote:

Do you think it does a reasonable job based on the provided sample?

IMHO the presented scan quality is more than sufficient. Nothing to complain about.

To really check the max. possible quality of the scanner I would recommend to use a high resolution B&W film, shoot with a capable lens at it's best aperture (usually something like F5.6 for 50mm "normal" lenses) and scan at max. resolution.

Will do at some point!    So far so good, I am not unhappy with the results.

Here are some frames from Roll #2

Frame 35

Frame 36

Cheers,

Max

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Regards, Thomas Bernardy
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http://www.maximesiegler.com/roll-2-x570/

Getting used to Portra 400, lovely film.

Cheers,

Max