The best film camera ever made? - Minolta Maxxum 9 Review 

Nice!!!

My favorite thing about the Nikon F6 cameras is that they use the f-mount which has a huge catalog of glass available from AI all the way through G. The Minolta and Canon definitely have a bit less backwards and forwards compatibility. Like I love my FD glass, but I’ve never bought a EF film camera because none of my lenses work on it.

@@thisisbenji90 that's pretty fair. the lenses are also quite cheap compared to Canon ef equivalents and Sony has made an adapter to use them on their mirrorless cameras. I'd say it's worth investing in especially for someone already in the Sony ecosystem

Not hat I'm aware. All 9's required the upgrade.

unfortunately the only options now are investing $1000 into an ssm upgraded body or getting a minolta 7 which although very similar has a slightly less desirable build quality. the two main fault points being the film door lock and the aperture gear

@@areallyrealisticguyd4333 I've never had an issue with my Dynax 7 build quality. Yes, it's not built like the Dynax 9 but I've not had any issues with it during the time I was actively shooting with it. However, after an extended period of time parts can fail. The hand grip on my (once workhorse) Dynax 700si went sticky while in storage and eventually broke apart. I don't know how much a modified Dynax 9 is worth but I find it hard to let mine go even though I no long shoot film. Its AF may be basic by modern standards but the camera is beautiful to shoot with.

I've got a 9000!

Yes, the camera will rewind the roll and leave the leader out. You can then put the same roll back in and it will wind it perfectly back to the frame you were on.

You can do it with basically every film camera - only those who roll up film without leaveing the tip outside, you need to use tool to get it out. In old exacta from '50 that was passed to me there is even mechanism inside the camera that let you cut the film in hlaf so that you can change mid roll without windint it. In this camera it is little bit spimpler because you dont need to shoot to first free frame. And dont we forget about aps-c format films and other similar, where you can switch films without winding ;)

With the leader return there are multiple settings, to leave the leader out or fully rewind the film.

@@takitam2521 maybe it was just the shitty one I had growing up then - the door was locked until the manual rewind was finished and came loose off the roll, and by then the leader was trapped fully inside.

Of course you can focus manually, just disengaging autofocus by a button near the lens.

@@Cototto or use the depth of field preview also on DOF preview (D) designated lenses.

And Sony makes an adapter for using Minolta AF glass on a modern E-mount camera. Even the Autofocus works.

It's the fastest shutter speed on ANY camera to this date. Although I struggle to think about the usage cases, unless you want to use TMax 3200 in broad daylight. I've done that with my A7 and it's a series of ridiculous compromises. The biggest problem with this camera is that it's a nice spec to have, but it's not really necessary, and the usage cases are very limited for most people.

@@contentsdiffer5958 the A9/Maxxum 9/Dynax 9 is a very amazing camera that costs about a quarter of the price of the equivalent Nikon F6, or Canon 1N/1V. It was one of the very last true professional film SLRs in a weird period prior to 2007 where the internet was common but professional DSLRs were not due to how much they cost. I wouldn't recommend an A9 unless you plan on paying for one that is SSM enabled, so you can use the Sony A mount lenses. I have an A7 which has a 1/8000 shutter speed, a more modern menu system, and even a matrix metering system. The advantage of the A9 is that it is more reliable, the body is weather sealed, provided you use weather sealed lenses, it has a faster auto exposure system, and the shutter speed tops out at 1/16000 of a second. Given that ISO3200 film isn't even really a thing anymore outside of Delta and Tmax, there is no real use case for a 1/16000 shutter in terms of exposure, but I guess it does give you more exposure choices in bright daylight without having to use an ND filter on sunny days with fast film. The drawback between the A7 and A9 all things being equal that both cameras are SSM models and therefore can use Sony's lenses with in built motors, is that the A9 is extremely heavy, the body is made out of alloy, and in some rare cases if you buy the right model, the A9s body can be made out of Titanium. The positives of the A7 are that it comes with SSM support by default, has an actual menu system that works as well as an early DSLR, and it's light weight. The drawbacks of the A7 because of its light weight is that the components inside of it are unreliable. The focus motor at this point is known to fail and when it does you will get an error screen on the camera, bricking the camera, as it starts up and tries to do a system checkup on the camera... I'd struggle to call it a computer by modern standards but the A7 does have a computer in it, that checks all of the components just like modern cameras have. It also has computational matrix metering in the A7 so if the light metering is bad, it's bad only because you measured it badly. The A9 does the same thing with Matrix metering but there are less computational things going on in the background. TBH: The A7 and A9 due to their ability to meter almost perfectly are the almost perfect cameras for slide film, and that's where the market was back then, for professionals, who has to get slides copied. Run a roll of Ektar, Provia, or Velvia through an A7 or A9 and it will come out almost as well as colour negative film, and ultimately that's what these cameras were for, Making perfect slides that could easily be copied for magazine prints on Durst enlargers. If you don't need something like that these cameras have too much technology in them and are now at a point where they are regularly failing after 25 years of use.

@@contentsdiffer5958 they're kinda cool cameras, but in hindsight retrospectively today because they're not something common like on the Canon EF or Nike FX mount and use the Sony/Minolta A mount, it does take a lot of ingenuity by comparison to trick them out to the same extent as a Nikon F6. To which it extent, it often leaves the argument, why would you buy a Minolta when it's far easier to buy a Nikon and just use a far more common platform. Well, in the end, even after your finished (in my case for example) it's far cheaper to stick a Carl Zeiss Vario Sonar F/2.8 on my A7 than it was to buy a Nikon F6. I also get to be one of the select group of people who uses Zeiss glass rather than Nikon glass.

The AF assist light stays off in continuous AF mode, or you can try putting some tape over the light. It will focus slower under low light, or not at all if it's too dark, but most of the time it should still do fine.

@@ahoNikkuThanks. Just picked up a mint copy this weekend (with flash, trigger, remote, 50 f/1.4 etc). Like it so far, other than the dim display in the viewfinder.

Not sure about the Maxxum 9, but on the 7 you can turn it off in the custom settings.

I never had an issues with the Minolta flash shoe as I only used the Minolta flashguns. I liked the fact that once you attached a flash gun they are automatically secured. However for photographers switching systems the Minolta flash shoe probably was a minor inconvenience.

Because Minolta did a lot of distasteful things like that, that Sony in that time period inherited. They decided to break a standard for flash shoes, that had been around since Olympus invented modern TTL flash units in the 1970s. There is disruption and just being a dick. Even Sony no longer uses that flash pin configuration.

@@contentsdiffer5958 its a horse trade scenario. It's far cheaper to buy an A7 for Sony SSM lenses, such as the Vario Sonar 24-70 F/2.8 I have attached to my A7. If you have the money to afford it and don't mind the extra weight, an SSM enabled A9 is a more reliable camera at this point. A lot of people who own these cameras now choose the A9 because it was built better at the end of the day. The trade off is that you pay a fortune for an SSM enabled A9 now.... And as such prices closer to the Nikon F6, or Canon 1N/1V which already support internal motor drive lenses by default. I had to send back two A7s to Japan to find one that just works without it giving the bricking ERROR screen. I also use SSM lenses with my A7 to reduce the probability of what is likely to happen anyway that the internal focus motor will fail eventually one day. At least by using SSM lenses (wuth internal motors in the lens) I'm slightly reducing that point of failure. But really if I wanted to spend the serious money I would just buy an A9 that was SSM enabled. In a lot of ways except the weight, the A9 is a far superior camera, but it was designed to be. Minolta through everything at it to make a camera that was better than a Nikon F6 and in a lot of ways they did. It just weighs A LOT.

That's because of convergent evolution really. The Minolta A7 and A9 are pretty much the closest thing to using a digital camera, but with film. All be it they released in a time period between 1998 to 2003 where one company named Minolta was brave, or foolish enough to try to put all the bells and whistles a modern DSLR camera would have on a film camera.