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First of all: I LOVE the Rollei 35.
It has been my favorite little camera since I got interested in photography.
I've had a bunch of rangefinders, including the Canonet QL-17 GIII, Konica auto S3 and Oympus RC.
I've had the Petri Color 35, many of those Minox, Agfa Optimas, Pens and
Demis. But I kept only the Rollei. (OK, the cute Agfa Optima 1035 too)
I like scale focusing cameras, estimating distance was never the reason for the missed shots (more often it was the exposure...).
One of my first prints I have sold was made with the Petri Color 35.
I had the Contax G1 with the Planar and Sonnar lens, but I never got comfortable
with it. I had the Minolta CLE and the 40mm lens, and I sold that too.
The Rollei 35 feels solid, like it is made out of one metal block. It is reliable,
has a sharp lens, all in one the best street camera ever!
Its controls are manageable, after you get used to it, and I liked the possibility
to take a correct exposed shot without looking trough the viewfinder.
Beside the Rollei I always had a digital camera. For last 3 years it was the Sony
R1, some months ago I replaced it with the pentax K10D DSLR and some exiting lenses (like the 50mm f1.2). But the Rollei was still the sidekick in the bag.
Some weeks ago, my wife asked me to find her a camera she could use to take short videos of our little boy, and also some pictures. Mostly in bright daylight,
outdoors and indoors... and it had to be cheap, easy to use and small. So after some research I found the Samsung NV series the most appealing and one detail reminded me of the Rollei.
Just like the Rollei, the Samsung has a completely different approach to controls.
Instead of many buttons and endless lists of settings, the most adjustments are made on the surface of the GUI, just by combinations of values.
So I compared the performance with the rollei 35s: the lens starts around 35mm with f2.8, and then darkens to f5.6 only after 3x zoom. Still, the 35mm f2.8 is a nice start. ISO goes to 3200, but is actually useless beyond ISO800, for color prints already at ISO400! But again, ISO100 to 400 it is ok.
The NV8 is the 8mp version; I guess the 10mp and 12mp versions perform much worse regarding the noise. And the kind of noise is not bad either, reminding of pushed b&w film when converted correctly in CS3.
So this small, black, simple, cheap, almost all metal, digital camera (without a
viewfinder) had easily replaced the 35s in my pocket. The image quality at iso 100
and 200 was comparable to film prints up to A4 size from the rollei!
It has limited manual controls, allowing you to set the aperture (limited to two
values) and shutter speed.
It is smaller, lighter, faster, and more accurate than the 35s.
The only problem, I now have a useless dark room, and some bottles of chemicals I have to get rid of.
The rollei 35s is now on the shelf, safe from scratches, dust and raindrops.
And I guess I have to buy a second for my wife now.
But at the price of only 180€...
Any other digital cameras out there that have some "classics" potential?
It has been my favorite little camera since I got interested in photography.
I've had a bunch of rangefinders, including the Canonet QL-17 GIII, Konica auto S3 and Oympus RC.
I've had the Petri Color 35, many of those Minox, Agfa Optimas, Pens and
Demis. But I kept only the Rollei. (OK, the cute Agfa Optima 1035 too)
I like scale focusing cameras, estimating distance was never the reason for the missed shots (more often it was the exposure...).
One of my first prints I have sold was made with the Petri Color 35.
I had the Contax G1 with the Planar and Sonnar lens, but I never got comfortable
with it. I had the Minolta CLE and the 40mm lens, and I sold that too.
The Rollei 35 feels solid, like it is made out of one metal block. It is reliable,
has a sharp lens, all in one the best street camera ever!
Its controls are manageable, after you get used to it, and I liked the possibility
to take a correct exposed shot without looking trough the viewfinder.
Beside the Rollei I always had a digital camera. For last 3 years it was the Sony
R1, some months ago I replaced it with the pentax K10D DSLR and some exiting lenses (like the 50mm f1.2). But the Rollei was still the sidekick in the bag.
Some weeks ago, my wife asked me to find her a camera she could use to take short videos of our little boy, and also some pictures. Mostly in bright daylight,
outdoors and indoors... and it had to be cheap, easy to use and small. So after some research I found the Samsung NV series the most appealing and one detail reminded me of the Rollei.
Just like the Rollei, the Samsung has a completely different approach to controls.
Instead of many buttons and endless lists of settings, the most adjustments are made on the surface of the GUI, just by combinations of values.
So I compared the performance with the rollei 35s: the lens starts around 35mm with f2.8, and then darkens to f5.6 only after 3x zoom. Still, the 35mm f2.8 is a nice start. ISO goes to 3200, but is actually useless beyond ISO800, for color prints already at ISO400! But again, ISO100 to 400 it is ok.
The NV8 is the 8mp version; I guess the 10mp and 12mp versions perform much worse regarding the noise. And the kind of noise is not bad either, reminding of pushed b&w film when converted correctly in CS3.
So this small, black, simple, cheap, almost all metal, digital camera (without a
viewfinder) had easily replaced the 35s in my pocket. The image quality at iso 100
and 200 was comparable to film prints up to A4 size from the rollei!
It has limited manual controls, allowing you to set the aperture (limited to two
values) and shutter speed.
It is smaller, lighter, faster, and more accurate than the 35s.
The only problem, I now have a useless dark room, and some bottles of chemicals I have to get rid of.
The rollei 35s is now on the shelf, safe from scratches, dust and raindrops.
And I guess I have to buy a second for my wife now.
But at the price of only 180€...
Any other digital cameras out there that have some "classics" potential?