Contax T2/T3 prices

bucs

bucs

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Am I the only one who thinks that prices for Contax T2 and T3 are outrageous at the moment?

$500 upwards for a T2
$900 upwards for a T3

I seem to recall prices then for each camera were a couple of hundred bucks lower and I wouldn't bite then.

Heck, for the price of a T3 I could use the money to buy a Leica M2 and CV 35/2.5 color skopar!
 
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I sold my T3 a few years ago, before I rediscovered film, for about $400. Wish I had kept it.
Funny thing is I first took it to Samys Camera in LA as they buy used gear, but they wouldn't offer me anything for it as they said it was worthless!
 
I sold my T3 for a comparatively modest price of $1000 last month, in China.

This may sound stupid, but what I heard is a certain Korean star was shown wearing a T3 as a personal camera (or rather, a fashion accessory) last year, driving fan girls into buying frenzy. I did witness them picking up which ever the T3s they came through regardless of price tags, not having a clue what these little metal boxes were until then.

The T2 was under a similar circumstance, its price on a steady rise during the past 2 years (back in 2013 you could buy a T2 for as low as 20,000 yen in Japan, if memory serves). After all these years the Porsche styling seems to be fairing well again...
 
Yes, I noticed this the other day too; the prices seem way up from 3-4 years ago (last time I looked). Some of the asking prices for T2s/T3s on the auction site are nuts. Interesting to know that there might be celebrity endorsement effects at play.
 
I don't think those celebrity 'endorsements' are making any difference - the prices have been rising for a few years. I had the chance to buy an ex-demo, boxed black T3 for $1000 a year or so ago - and passed because it felt expensive. Now I'm lucky if I see that sort of camera for less than around $1600-1700 (and usually these cameras aren't even in the same shape).
Guess it's sort of the downside of film's revival...
 
P67

P67

Archlich said:
I sold my T3 for a comparatively modest price of $1000 last month, in China.

This may sound stupid, but what I heard is a certain Korean star was shown wearing a T3 as a personal camera (or rather, a fashion accessory) last year, driving fan girls into buying frenzy. I did witness they picking up which ever the T3s they came through regardless of price tags, not having a clue what these little metal boxes were until then.

The T2 was under a similar circumstance, its price on a steady rise during the past 2 years (back in 2013 you could buy a T2 for as low as 20,000 yen in Japan, if memory serves). After all these years the Porsche styling seems to be fairing well again...
Click to expand...

I'm confident and 100% sure that the P67's price will never hit outrageous levels hahaha! 😉
 
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Archlich said:
I sold my T3 for a comparatively modest price of $1000 last month, in China.

This may sound stupid, but what I heard is a certain Korean star was shown wearing a T3 as a personal camera (or rather, a fashion accessory) last year, driving fan girls into buying frenzy. I did witness they picking up which ever the T3s they came through regardless of price tags, not having a clue what these little metal boxes were until then.

The T2 was under a similar circumstance, its price on a steady rise during the past 2 years (back in 2013 you could buy a T2 for as low as 20,000 yen in Japan, if memory serves). After all these years the Porsche styling seems to be fairing well again...
Click to expand...

Yep, that Korean star is being cursed by a lot of people who want to by T3 in Chinese networks these days...
 
Archlich said:
This may sound stupid, but what I heard is a certain Korean star was shown wearing a T3 as a personal camera (or rather, a fashion accessory) last year, driving fan girls into buying frenzy. I did witness they picking up which ever the T3s they came through regardless of price tags, not having a clue what these little metal boxes were until then.

The T2 was under a similar circumstance, its price on a steady rise during the past 2 years (back in 2013 you could buy a T2 for as low as 20,000 yen in Japan, if memory serves). After all these years the Porsche styling seems to be fairing well again...
Click to expand...
Probably had to do something, adding up on a baseline appreciation.

Contax has a couple of systems that appreciated/maintained very well. The T's and the 645. Time for someone to drop a reissue!

So it goes from "this is great gear, and cheap, buy" people buy up, supply dries a bit, people make reviews and youtube videos, price keeps rising, cool cat uses it, prices go up a notch... and there we are.

bucs said:
I'm confident and 100% sure that the P67's price will never hit outrageous levels hahaha! 😉
Click to expand...
Ironies aside, I didn't quite follow the system prices, but the P67II appreciated and there was a thread about this topic in the forum a while ago. Then the 150 2.4 is making rounds for its rendition.

Turns out pentaxforums has a price history graph: https://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/SMC-Pentax-67-105mm-F2.4-Lens.html
U shaped 😱

Perhaps I should have dropped the heavy dough for one a couple of years ago instead of getting a Fuji 6x9...
 
I gave to my daughter a Yashica, it was labeled either T2 or T3. It had a Zeiss lens.

At the time I bought it, a long way ime ago, I thought I was told it was basically the same camera as Contax but at less price. Plastic body.

It took beautiful photographs. One photograph I made at the Arboretum, I had enlarged and framed, about a 30x24.

At any rate I thought I'd pass my thoughts to you as you may consider a Yashica camera.

Article with #9 mentions Yashica (Contax as well in the article):

http://www.digitalrev.com/article/the-10-best-35mm-point-and-shoots-ever-made
 
Well I just hope the increase in price on film cameras because of the high demand also translates to more people buying film
 
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It is not surprising. Contax T, T2 and T3 are very good cameras.

Interest in film and film demand is increasing.
The demand for lots of very good cameras is increasing.
That leads to increasing camera prices for those cameras.

But currently still quite a lot of cameras are much underrated. You can get them still at extreme bargain prices (e.g. Nikon F80, F90X, F100, F5; Canon EOS 1n, EOS 1V, EOS 30/33V, EOS 300X, Minolta Dynax 7 and 9, Dynax 800si, the Rolleiflex 6000 series, Mamiya 645 Pro TL, the Zenza Bronicas, Leica R4, R5, R7).

Excellent time for buyers, and currently it is the best time to built up your complete system, with main camera and second camera (or backup).
Now is the time to buy. It will not become cheaper!
In the coming years the used film camera prices generally will rise with the increasing interest in film and its revival.
 
More so, interest in no b/s point and shoot "film look" is still on the rise, the Instagram crowd is the main buyer of these. Thanks to the multitude of bloggers recommending the contax p/s for the "lifestyle" and "street" crowds, the price has gone up crazy.
 
I agree, camera prices rising by days! In 2014 I bought a nice T2 in box for a modest sum of 150Euros and shot few rolls with it, but it felt kinda a bit too heavy for a compact camera, so I kept it inside the box and was using Gr1s more often, and in 2015 it sold T2 for 350euros, buyer was very happy and so was I. Now, recently I checked the prices on analog gear and spotted one again, couldn't believe my eyes😱 Its seems that we might even see a new analog camera manufactured by a company like Nikon , Olympus or even Sony( with Minolta engineers help) who knows?
 
It's hurting to do so, but this is exactly why I'm selling my T3 at the moment.

Still holding onto the T2, unless they suddenly jump up again, but it reached the point where I couldn't justify holding on to it vs what I could buy.
 
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