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Reviews: 17
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Brought this in 2013 at ~US$330 equivalent, with a yellowed standard 105mm f/2.4 lens, and a non-metered prism. No MLU. No wooden handle. Slightly infected with mold.
I love this camera a lot; this may be the only choice of 6x7 format that looks like a 135-format SLR. This beast is HUGE; when you hold it in your hand, 135-format cameras and lenses suddenly become dwarfs. I'm writing in more detail in Bad things and Notes for those who may feel interested. But this is a great camera.
Good things - It operates like a 135-format SLR. Not like the boxy Hasselblad, not like TLR, not rangefinder. But SLR.
- Comparatively cheap for 120-format. Hasselblad and Rollei are expensive. Fuji has several 6x9 rangefinders, but they are also expensive. Only Mamiya products are comparable in price. In contrast, most 135-format "professional" SLR are at the similar price range. So if you would like to shoot larger formats, P6x7 is the excellent choice.
- Plenty of choices for lenses. From fisheye, wide-angle, standard, tele, super-tele, you name it. A bonus is, you can buy an adapter to fit them into any 135-format SLR, DSLR (cropped or not) and any other systems, and then you have plenty of tele-lenses with crazy-large apertures. E.g. 165mm f2.8 is ~f1.4, and 300mm f4 is ~f2 to 135-format. And 105mm f2.4 is ~f0.6 to four thirds system (and who knows what you can do with it...) (A calculator can be found here: http://www.okayan.jp/focal-length-calc.html)
- Super bright viewfinder.
- Lenses provide different experience from 135-format. My 105mm f2.4 gives absolutely dreamy photos when I have a close subject (1 - 4m) and a distant background. 135-format 50mm f1.4 (kind of expensive) may gives the same dreamy-ness to you, probably when shooting macro. So you have to experience this 6x7 format to feel the difference!!
- Interchangeable viewfinder. Not only you have more choices, but you can also DIY a transparent slide with a grid, to make composing more convenient. This cannot be done with most 135-format SLR.
- ....... plus most other good points others have said.
Bad things - Heavy body, heavy lenses. Your faith on your strip and the two tiny metal clips will be put to test.
- Mirror shake-ness. I don't have the MLU mod (which I don't mind). But unlike smaller SLRs which use springs and sponge to dampen the mirror, the 6x7 mirror is attached to gears, so there is no dampening at all. 1/60s seems to be my bodily limit, while 135-format film-shooting SLR I can go to 1/4s and 1s in rangefinder. BTW, due to gravity (or mental effects), shooting portrait will suffer more than shooting landscape.
- Complicated shutter operation when film is not loaded. (1) Open the back. (2) Use your thumb to turn the film counter to anywhere after zero. (3) Hold your thumb and close the back. (4) Make sure battery is inserted unless you would like to purposely "jam" the mirror. (5) Cock and fire.
- Battery-dependent. If you cock and fire your shutter without a battery, the mirror will be "jammed". You will need a battery to reset the mirror, and will have one frame wasted if you have a roll loaded. Not to mention someone may seriously jam a camera if one does not know s/he need a battery and flip the mirror by force. If you are buying one at a shop, make sure to test the shutter with a battery before the deal is done.
- Mirror cannot be manually flipped. If you want to clean the interior and if you don't have MLU mod, you can't reach the interior. You may want to cock and fire the shutter without a battery to "jam" the mirror, in order to clean the interior. If you have MLU, however, locking up the mirror drain your battery.
- Slow reloading time. You can practice and reload faster, but I find that I better sit down, and have it reloaded on a table. It feels safer, or if I would either drop my roll or my camera.
- Slow flash sync (but I never shoot with flash, so no problem to me).
Notes - Since the viewfinder is interchangeable, you may find tempting to take it off and put it back on very often. And that's why I dropped my viewfinder on concrete floor, and left a crack in the prism glass (fortunately still usable). Don't follow my stupidity:(!!
- When reloading, make sure the empty spool should have the slit pointing vertically up. This ensures the roll to be correctly aligned with the counting mechanism. Otherwise, the last frame may be cropped. (Film used: Kodak B&W T-Max 100)
- The shutter curtain is extra-fragile due to its large area; beware not to poke it, purposely or accidentally!!!
- Wind your film gently. The pressure plate gives lots of friction to the film. If you do not wind films gently, you may wear off or break the winding gears.
- The official lens cap has two metal clips, so you can scratch your lens easily. Besides it produces lots of metal debris. Buy a plastic one immediately.
- Since this camera is heavy, you need a heavy tripod rather than a light one to avoid tipping off; carbon-fiber ones are therefore not recommended. And if you are shooting with tele-lenses, you may have to use two tripods, or DIY a rig so that one tripod can hold them both steadily.
- Lenses mostly focus over-infinity. Most of the lenses - including my 105mm f2.4 - have infinity focuses located at about 1mm from the center of "infinity" sign. The purpose of making this is unknown (infrared photography??). But you have to focus with your own eyes to make perfect infinity focus, but not to assume "turning to the end means infinity".
- MLU is not necessary to me. It depends on personal preferences. If you are a street shooter, you probably don't have to use MLU since operation is clumsy; you may need high ISO films. If you are a studio shooter, you can adjust lighting rather than using flash, and you can fix the camera onto a tripod (or a concrete block :lol: ) to dampen the mirror shake. People has been saying that Pentax will not repair non-MLU ones since they don't produce those gears anymore. I would say, if you have shot so many times that your gears are broken, you should probably buy another one rather than repairing it; otherwise, non-Pentax or DIY repair will always help with jamming if you are not replacing any parts.
- Older lenses use radioactive elements to make glasses. They will become yellow and tint your color-film. But there is no problem when shooting black-and-white.
In conclusion, I love this camera a lot. There are more things that I have to pay attention to than other 135-format SLR, but the experience is more than I have expected. And all those "bad" things are actually things to be avoided, but not serious defects. I'm surprised that I, as a hobbyist, can buy a professional system camera, suitable for both outdoor and indoor photography, at such a low price. You will enjoy this camera like I do if you have one!!
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