Do you use an APS P&S camera?

Do you use an APS P&S camera?

  • I use one regularly

    Votes: 15 10.0%
  • I use one occasionally

    Votes: 23 15.3%
  • I have used one, but do not any more

    Votes: 44 29.3%
  • I have not used one, but I would like to try

    Votes: 15 10.0%
  • I have not used one and never will

    Votes: 53 35.3%

  • Total voters
    150
I had an Ixus Z70 back in 2000, I believe. I liked it for its size and the standard size prints were sort of okay. In fact, I brought it as my only camera to Egypt for a trip on the Nile and later also for a weekend to Rome. That reminds me to do these trips again just to properly shoot them :)
 
My friend bought APS camera for it's size, at same time when I got Epic. He asked, why he has went APS if he could get same sized or smaller Epic.
I have seen some cute-looking APS cameras, but never bid on them as this would add another film format with all that follows from this fact.
 
Minolta Vectis 300

Minolta Vectis 300

I still use my Minolta Vectis 300 occasionally. Wow, both the camera and its maker are extinct!

I bought it in 1998 mostly due to its great specs: an all-glass lens group with aspheric elements, 24-70mm f/5.7-9.8 (35mm equiv. of 30-87mm), close focus of 16 inches, and stepless zoom. Plus it weighs just 8oz and is stylish as well with its all stainless-steel skin.

I took it on a Mediterranean cruise to eight countries -- it never let me down and I got some great shots with it. With modern films I'd consider it to be about a 6-7MP camera. Film processing/scanning costs are about the only drawback if you don't need prints bigger than 8x10" or perhaps 16x9".

I may even start using it more as my walkaround color camera, sticking to B&W in 35mm format.
 
Fuji

Fuji

We have had a Fuji Fotonex 300 Zoom for about 7-8 years. I originally bought it as a reasonably good travel camera and it has not disappointed. The quality of the photographs is very good and it is still used as a second P&S colour camera by my wife when we travel and for 'family' shots. It sits in the kitchen ready for immediate use.
I do have a Canon IXUS 65 digital P&S but that's just for getting photos to paste into my consulting reports or when I want to email something quickly so I usually take it on business trips. Otherwise it doesn't get used.
My main hobby interest is mono, using my Bessa 3A or one of my Leica IIIf's. Only problem these days is I seem to have to unload any partly exposed film from the cameras before going to the airport and place all film in a lead-lined bag and ask for a hand inspection. The cameras have to go though the X-ray. A pain, but otherwise I would have to go digital.
I still end up arguing with some security guys who clearly have no knowledge of photgraphic film and stoutly believe that their x-ray machines are harmless to any sort of film. I often have to demand to see their manager to get the hand inspection for my film bag.
 
Leigh Youdale said:
I still end up arguing with some security guys who clearly have no knowledge of photgraphic film and stoutly believe that their x-ray machines are harmless to any sort of film. I often have to demand to see their manager to get the hand inspection for my film bag.
Well, I have had modern films going through x-ray machines a couple of times without any effects. Modern x-ray machines have a much smaller intensity of radiation than the ones used in the 1980s and before. It is also possible that modern visible light films are less sensitive to x-rays. In any case, both color negative and slide film, ISO 100-400, through x-ray machines several times during travel, no fogging or other x-ray effects I could recognize. It was a risk for sure, but I had heard similar positive experiences from others before the trip and that made me willing to take it.

However, I did not shoot any B&W during that trip and from the limited knowledge I have about photochemistry my guess would be that B&W film might be more sensitive to x-rays.
 
I don't use them much any more, but I must confess that have acquired some of them (for example Contax Tix, Leica C11, Nikon Nuvis V and I also have a Canon EOS IX).

They have been mostly my travel cameras, before digital p&s period and before I bought a filmscanner a couple a years ago. After that, I have evoked my good old b&w photography hobby. So, now I shoot mostly traditional 35mm b&w film with my RF- and SLR-gear. :)
 
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I used to have a Canon Ixus (first model) which I liked a lot for its size and ergonomics. But it had some quirks. The viewfinder was never sharp and worse still, at some zoom settings neither were the photos. It was never great in the sharpness department, but as I say at some settings it was diabolical. I ended up selling it and buying a lovely Contax T2 which was much more expensive but also had a much much better lens (albeit more limited too as it is a fixed 38mm lens from memory.) I still use the latter and its a great camera, every bit as good as the Leica and top end Nikon point and shoot cameras. Of course it is a 35mm camera not APS.
 
If there had been an option for" No, but I have a digital camera with APS-C sensor, I could have clicked on that (I have an X100).
 
Strictly speaking, a interchangeable lens SLR (Minolta Vectis S-100) but with the 17mm it is smaller than many first generation 35mm point-and-shoots. I got the camera for free when digital took over, but film and processing costs were much higher than 35mm even before all film went the way of the Dodo, so it only got used for three rolls. By 2008, the best film types presumably had already vanished, all I could still get was Kodak, Fuji and Agfa medium speed CN, the prints from which were just about up to those from a 4MP digital - somewhere on the borders of acceptable, but not quite good enough to stay. It there still had been chrome or black and white around I might have done more with it...
 
Hi,

The Contax Tix was a great little camera, ditto the zoom lensed Konica Revio Z3 and the Rollei Nano. Alas my stock of APS film is low and I've finished all the B&W film.

A great pity the film's not made any more.

Regards, David
 
Around the time of the OP in this thread, 2007, I was desperately trying to find a good Contax T3, and came across a mint condition Contax Tix. Not knowing that much about the difference between 35mm and aps film at that time, I briefly considered it as a substitute. Thank goodness I didn't get it, and bought my lovely T3 instead! The T3 is still usable today with any number of available films. The Tix, like all other aps cameras, is only as usable as the film you can get for it.
 
Around the time of the OP in this thread, 2007, I was desperately trying to find a good Contax T3, and came across a mint condition Contax Tix. Not knowing that much about the difference between 35mm and aps film at that time, I briefly considered it as a substitute. Thank goodness I didn't get it, and bought my lovely T3 instead! The T3 is still usable today with any number of available films. The Tix, like all other aps cameras, is only as usable as the film you can get for it.

Hi,

But what are fridges for? I stocked up with APS and am now down to 4 or 5 rolls.

Regards, David
 
I have a complete set of Nikon APS SLR cameras with lenses.

:eek:

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Looks like a camera store shelf from the 1990s
 

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I saw this thread a while back, and not long after that I asked my local camera store if they still developed APS film, and they did. She was grumpy about the expense they went to back in 1996 or so to buy the minilab, but it still works fine, and even automatically scans the film to CD... 2.0 megapixels!

Not long after that I saw a little Elph Jr. in the old camera bin at a thrift shop, and it was only 99¢, so I bought it. I found a roll of unshot film in a box in the basement, and bought a battery for the camera. When the battery went in, I found that the previous owner had just put a new roll of film in the camera, perhaps years ago, and it was showing "1" on the counter. I still haven't shot all of that first roll through yet, so I'm curious to see how it does.

Scott
 
Not long after that I saw a little Elph Jr. in the old camera bin at a thrift shop, and it was only 99¢, so I bought it. I found a roll of unshot film in a box in the basement, and bought a battery for the camera. When the battery went in, I found that the previous owner had just put a new roll of film in the camera, perhaps years ago, and it was showing "1" on the counter. I still haven't shot all of that first roll through yet, so I'm curious to see how it does.

Sounds like you're about to have a fun time. There's always something cool about experimenting with a new camera. Post some images if/when you can! And I wonder what lies on that first mystery image??
 
I know this is an old thread, but I still carry the Fuji Fotonex 100E I bought in 1996 or so as a pocket camera. One of my local stores still processes APS. They bought a large quantity of one of the last batches of APS made and still have several hundred rolls in stock, it all expired October of 2014 but kept in the right conditions it will still be good for years. I currently have 5 or 6 rolls in my freezer.
 
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