UPDATE of my "Newbie Request for Info" of Jun 12

Hi, All,

This is an update to my thread from Fri Jun 12 17:07:29 2009 titled: "A
newbie request help selecting digital camera" Xref:
number.nntp.dca.giganews.com rec.photo.digital:1605603 .

First, THANK YOU =:-D to the following people for generously offering me
so much information:
"Charles"
ASAAR
as well as:
Savageduck
tony cooper
dj_nme
Matt Ion
and
nick c

What I ended up getting was a DSLR: Sony Alpha 230 - I learned that I need
to get an "MD-Maxxum" adapter (which seems to be available thru Amazon.com
for about $40 w/ S&H) to use my old manual Minolta lenses with it, but so
far, the lens it came with ( 18-55 SAM ) is providing me with a lot of
entertainment for now =:-) I've read that it's not the best in th eworld,
BUT since the A@#) is a DSLR, I can think about exchanging lenses if/when I
get to where I'm actually taking the stypes of images I've been envisioning
taking - IOW once I accumulate what *I* consider to be a decent skill set
(and I admittedly tend to set VERY high standards for myself...).

IOW, it's a camera I can grow into, and that's vital for me, because I get
really bored *REALLY* quickly with anything that's "underpowered" or "too
simplistic". I also like that the viewfinder (diopter) is adjustable,
since I'm at that age where my eyes are changing every year or two.

I just bought it this past Saturday, so I stil haven;t finished going
through the manula and experimenting with all the toys - but so far, I have
to say that it's been giving me what IMO is the proverbial Best Of Both
Worlds. It doesn't have "live view", but it *does* have the vital "picture
review" - and the LCD screen is big enough, and of high-enough quality!,
for me to actually see the reviews decently LOL!

The autofocus has actually been fun - but best of all, it's simple to
switch to manual if I want. Meanwhile, it's not at all obstrusive, and is
helping me to adjust the diopter with the image quality. ((I've been using
things like multicolored ibuprofin etc jars LOL! - silyl as subjects but
teh ombo of lettering and weird colors are serving me well as comparisons -
and BEST of all, I'm not having to pay umpteen bucks to develop a roll of
experimental film. Plus, the image library has all the image info, so it's
super-simple to compare which settings I used for which image result.

Since I prefer taking nature-related photos (iincl. a couple portraits of
my small parrot, a.k.a. "Master and Commander" LOL! ), the ease of
switching from auto to manula, and the (future) switching of lenses, will
work fine for me 99.99% of the time.

I wish I had it with me outside eysterday evening, tho', because I was
outside at twilight looking at my tall grass (my _Panicum virgatum_ 'Dallas
Blues' is up to about 10' tall, including the seed-heads), when the far
corner of my eye caught a shadow passing over the pool (the water i s deep
sapphire-blue because of the color I chose), and I turned my head in time
to see a hawk swoop MAYBE 5'-6' away from me, and maybe 8"-12" off the
surface of thw water, then rise just enough to land on the far (SW-facing)
fence! Of course, not having it with me is a whole differnt issue, which
the combination of relative-ease-of-use plus fairly light weight is going
to take care of pretty quickly, as I get more in the habit of making it my
faithful companion =:-D

Anyway, since a coupel folks had expressed an interest in receiving an
update, ther it is - Plus, I want to once again thank teh people who
were so generous with their time in offering me so much usefuil info and
good links so I could get started searching.

I guess my next step will be to opem a Flickr account =:-D !

Happy snapping!

- Kris K.

"Kris Krieger" wrote in message
...


What I ended up getting was a DSLR: Sony Alpha 230 - I learned that I
need
to get an "MD-Maxxum" adapter (which seems to be available thru Amazon.com
for about $40 w/ S&H) to use my old manual Minolta lenses with it, but so

I'm an old Minolta guy myself, had most of the Minolta SLRs from the XE-7
on, and most of the lenses they made from the 16mm fisheye to the 500mm
mirror. About a year after they brought out the Maxxum in 1985, I bought
one, and of course it immediately obsoleted my existing collection of lenses
so I had to start over (grumble grumble) but it was worth it.

I would not hold out too much hope for an MD adapter. I've never used one
myself, but my understanding is that because of the difference in flange
distance between the MD and Maxxum A mounts, such an adapter can only give
you focus to infinity if it has a weak lens built into it which in effect
stretches the focal length of whatever MD lens you use with it. Minolta made
such an adapter which was quite expensive and I don't think users were very
satisfied with it -- I believe they are very hard to find now. Third-party
adapters are available which are much cheaper (like the one on Amazon), but
probably even less satisfactory than the Minolta one. The weak lens built
into the adapter undoubtedly degrades optical performance at least somewhat.

Besides, now that you have an autofocus DSLR you would soon tire of using
lenses which can only be focused manually.

I have a Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D, one of the last DSLR models they made
before selling the camera business to Sony. I haven't had occasion to use it
much, because I switched to Nikon not long after I bought it. Seems to be a
nice camera though. You should be able to find plenty of Maxxum-mount lenses
for your Sony on eBay -- I expect to be selling all mine probably this
coming winter, since I probably will not be using that system again.

Neil Harrington wrote:

"Kris Krieger" wrote in message
...


What I ended up getting was a DSLR: Sony Alpha 230 - I learned that I
need
to get an "MD-Maxxum" adapter (which seems to be available thru Amazon.com
for about $40 w/ S&H) to use my old manual Minolta lenses with it, but so

I'm an old Minolta guy myself, had most of the Minolta SLRs from the XE-7
on, and most of the lenses they made from the 16mm fisheye to the 500mm
mirror. About a year after they brought out the Maxxum in 1985, I bought
one, and of course it immediately obsoleted my existing collection of lenses
so I had to start over (grumble grumble) but it was worth it.

I would not hold out too much hope for an MD adapter. I've never used one
myself, but my understanding is that because of the difference in flange
distance between the MD and Maxxum A mounts, such an adapter can only give
you focus to infinity if it has a weak lens built into it which in effect
stretches the focal length of whatever MD lens you use with it. Minolta made
such an adapter which was quite expensive and I don't think users were very
satisfied with it -- I believe they are very hard to find now.

I think the good Minolta adapters are hard to find because they're
good -- when they do turn up they're pretty expensive. I think the
dissatisfaction isn't with quality, it is the bother of trying to do
manual focussing on a camera which probably has higher resolution than
you ever got from film, plus isn't designed to help you with manual
focussing.

I have a collection of Minolta MD glass and I got one of the old
Minolta adapters which was also a 1.4 teleconverter, because that gave
me more useful focal lengths from the MD lenses given the alpha lenses
I have. I'm impressed by the quality.

Check www.dyxum.com for detailed comments on the adapters.

Of course for macro work you don't need a lensed adapter.

--
Chris Malcolm

Kris:

Report back when you have more observations to share. I think you made a
great choice!

Happy shooting!

"Neil Harrington" wrote in
:


"Kris Krieger" wrote in message
...


What I ended up getting was a DSLR: Sony Alpha 230 - I learned that I
need
to get an "MD-Maxxum" adapter (which seems to be available thru
Amazon.com for about $40 w/ S&H) to use my old manual Minolta lenses
with it, but so

I'm an old Minolta guy myself, had most of the Minolta SLRs from the
XE-7 on, and most of the lenses they made from the 16mm fisheye to the
500mm mirror. About a year after they brought out the Maxxum in 1985, I
bought one, and of course it immediately obsoleted my existing
collection of lenses so I had to start over (grumble grumble) but it was
worth it.

I would not hold out too much hope for an MD adapter. I've never used
one myself, but my understanding is that because of the difference in
flange distance between the MD and Maxxum A mounts, such an adapter can
only give you focus to infinity if it has a weak lens built into it
which in effect stretches the focal length of whatever MD lens you use
with it. Minolta made such an adapter which was quite expensive and I
don't think users were very satisfied with it -- I believe they are very
hard to find now. Third-party adapters are available which are much
cheaper (like the one on Amazon), but probably even less satisfactory
than the Minolta one. The weak lens built into the adapter undoubtedly
degrades optical performance at least somewhat.

Hmm, all good points to consider. OTOH, I'll be using my credit-card points
to get the adapter on Amazon, making it essentially "free" LOL! So what the
heck, I'll give it a go

I don't have any expectations (probably because I don't know enough about
what I'm doing...) - if it works at all, I'll be amazed, so there's very
little downside g!

My main interest was taking photos of my stained glass work, and nature
close-ups.

I made a Flickr page he
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pterochromics
Please don't laugh TOO hard at my "baby" photos LOL! I have an immense
amount to learn...



Besides, now that you have an autofocus DSLR you would soon tire of
using lenses which can only be focused manually.

Could be. Have to try it, tho'


I have a Konica Minolta Maxxum 5D, one of the last DSLR models they made
before selling the camera business to Sony. I haven't had occasion to
use it much, because I switched to Nikon not long after I bought it.
Seems to be a nice camera though. You should be able to find plenty of
Maxxum-mount lenses for your Sony on eBay -- I expect to be selling all
mine probably this coming winter, since I probably will not be using
that system again.


This was a big purchase for me, so I'll ave to wait before getting more
lenses. Esp. given all teh glass I've been buying LOL!

Thanks for the tips!

- Kris

"Charles" wrote in news:h8rnvi$32o$1
@news.eternal-september.org:

Kris:

Report back when you have more observations to share. I think you made a
great choice!

Happy shooting!



Thanks! I posted a link to my first "baby steps" in the reply I wrote to
Neil Harrington - Flickr seems pretty convenient.
Eventually, I'll finish & upload my website (been saying that for abt 4 years
- now I have to hammer the javascript into working with Mozilla - bleh, I
really do NOT enjoy banging my head against code, but ya gotta do what ya
gotta do )

- Kris

Kris Krieger wrote:
"Neil Harrington" wrote in
:
"Kris Krieger" wrote in message
...

What I ended up getting was a DSLR: Sony Alpha 230 - I learned that I
need
to get an "MD-Maxxum" adapter (which seems to be available thru
Amazon.com for about $40 w/ S&H) to use my old manual Minolta lenses
with it, but so

I'm an old Minolta guy myself, had most of the Minolta SLRs from the
XE-7 on, and most of the lenses they made from the 16mm fisheye to the
500mm mirror. About a year after they brought out the Maxxum in 1985, I
bought one, and of course it immediately obsoleted my existing
collection of lenses so I had to start over (grumble grumble) but it was
worth it.

I would not hold out too much hope for an MD adapter. I've never used
one myself, but my understanding is that because of the difference in
flange distance between the MD and Maxxum A mounts, such an adapter can
only give you focus to infinity if it has a weak lens built into it
which in effect stretches the focal length of whatever MD lens you use
with it. Minolta made such an adapter which was quite expensive and I
don't think users were very satisfied with it -- I believe they are very
hard to find now. Third-party adapters are available which are much
cheaper (like the one on Amazon), but probably even less satisfactory
than the Minolta one. The weak lens built into the adapter undoubtedly
degrades optical performance at least somewhat.

Hmm, all good points to consider. OTOH, I'll be using my credit-card points
to get the adapter on Amazon, making it essentially "free" LOL! So what the
heck, I'll give it a go

I don't have any expectations (probably because I don't know enough about
what I'm doing...) - if it works at all, I'll be amazed, so there's very
little downside g!

My main interest was taking photos of my stained glass work, and nature
close-ups.

I made a Flickr page he
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pterochromics
Please don't laugh TOO hard at my "baby" photos LOL! I have an immense
amount to learn...

You'd probably find the Flickr Alpha groups interesting, such as

http://www.flickr.com/groups/sony_alpha/

and also

http://www.photoclubalpha.com/

which is concerned with Minolta and Sony alpha mount photography.

--
Chris Malcolm

Chris Malcolm wrote in
:

Kris Krieger wrote:
[...]

I made a Flickr page [...]

You'd probably find the Flickr Alpha groups interesting, such as

http://www.flickr.com/groups/sony_alpha/

and also

http://www.photoclubalpha.com/

which is concerned with Minolta and Sony alpha mount photography.


The Flickr group was one thing that helped me meake my decision to buy
tho' I'd first learned about Flickr from this group. It's cool to see so
much creativity.

The photoclub site looks good, also, so thank you for the link

- Kris