Hi Paul Yep my Minolta gear is autofocus....2 700si's and one 9xi(currently sent into minolta for repairs......ouch!!!).
But as your comment about what your seeing on the street, I think I've been seeing mostly digital P&S and a few 35mm P&S. My friends were all digital P&S as was I for a while, but the other day we were going for a ride on a back road and we came up on a field with a bunch of wild turkeys in it with a deer grazing in the middle of the flock. Of course we all wanted a pic so we bailed out and I figured I'd be pretty well SOL because they would scare them all away before I was ready. But they stayed and I was able to get my tripod set up with a 300mm lens with a doubler on my PZ-1. We had good light and even with the large f-stop loss I was able to get some great shots. My friends always tease me about my "old" film based equipment and how great their digital is. But when I got the film developed and scanned they were the ones eating turkey! In fact one of them even dumped his digital and is now currently trying to acquire some 35mm slr gear. They may start as P&S, but if they hang around me very long they will likely be forced to switch to SLR. I have one older pentax, an A3000 in totally mint condition, but even that's not one of the classics you mention. Nor was it every very popular for valid reasons, but that model was my very first SLR and thus it holds a place in my stable. Other then that I guess I like my gadgets too much. I tried a K1000, but never saw what folks see in that camera and peddled it a month later. Cheers Taz > From what I've seen, people may be buying SLRs, but they aren't using them > on a regular basis. I seldom see another SLR at public events. I don't see > them out on the street. When I shoot a school event, I'll see maybe three or > four other SLRs. One will be autofocus; the rest are vintage models like the > Canon AE-1. Ditto for my town's annual parade day: The numbers may grow, but > the percentages remain strongly in favor of classic models. > > A month ago, I was taking my lunchtime walk and was delighted to see a > high-school-age young man walking with a Cosina-made Nikon FM10 and its > bundled 35-70 (I think) zoom lens. It turns out he was doing his homework > assignment for a photography course. > > The only other SLR that I've spotted in seven months of walking was a PZ-1P > and 70-300 zoom. > > [EMAIL PROTECTED]
