Calling all serious Photobugs ...POLL !!

Shamrock

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AAAHHHHHHHHHH my head it hurts now after 2 months of reading reviews going over pros and cons ,feel like me head is going to bust.
As you are woundering what i am talking about let me fill you in a bit...

OK here it is i am begining to really get into my photography now(and i mean i don't mind spending 600 or 700 to get upgraded) and i want to upgrade (i know i know get this all the time ,but stick with me )
i want to shoot slides as you get better res. i lean more on the nature side of photograpy and old broken down farm house's that sort of stuff .
I have a minolta system now Minolta 450si ,tripod, minolta 35-70mm, a sigma 70-300mm F4-F5.6 apo super macro, and a minolta 50mm 1.7 and a sigma flash what i want from you guys is some opions on what do do next ...so heres the poll!

1) UPGRADED TO THE MINOLTA MAXXUM 7 ,KEEP MY LENSES
PROS- . nice semipro camera around 600$can.could just enjoy photograpy not worrie about sharpness
CONS- minolta lenses not many , not many really good ones

2) UPGRADE TO CANON ELAN 7E AND NEW LENSES
PROS- Canon glass lots of good lenses.
CONS- Whole new system like starting from sratch ,Elan 7e not as nice a camera as the minolta maxxum 7 i am a little worried about the metering of the elan, and that auto pop up flash.

3) SELL THE MINOLTA SYSTEM AND BUY A EOS 3
PROS- better camera then the elan
CONS- lot of money for a camera , buying this probally means no lens right at first.

4) SELL MINOLTA SYSTEM AND GET ELAN 7E AND ONE GOOD LENS (IF I CAN FIND ONE FOR A GOOD PRICE 70-300MM F4 MAYBE EBAY 5 OR 6OO$)
PROS- good lenses (never used canon i don't know how good there camera's are thats why its all ways there lenses i pro about) camera gets ok reviews and has some good fuctions.
CONS- i'm a minolta fan a bit worried about swtiching but i know there glass isn't that good from what i have been hearing. The Sigma lens 70-300mm APO super macro i just got (i know sigma lenses are not that good either but i just started to expand before really doing some hard thinking.

So as you can see , if you stuck with this long post , i'm stuck !!!! :( what to do what to do so please post a number ,what would you do ?
comments or thoughts are welcome. I would love to go Pro but so do we all right !!!! and i know that thats probally not going to happen with so many of us trying to do the same :D So with reality of it all i could just take a few photograpy classes and just enjoy the art of photograpy like i have been for the last few years or try pro go to a Photograpy school for a few years and hope for the best.
 
I'm a big Canon fan and I love my Canon's but I have to say that the Maxxum 7 appears to be a better camera than the Elan 7e from what I've read. I have no experience with Minolta, so I can't give you an answer as to quality glass.

My guess woiuld be that Tamron or Tokina would have some glass that would be good for you. I know Popular Photography really liked the new Tamron 24-135 f/3.5-5.6 lens.

That being said, the EOS 3 is a great camera. I wish I could afford one, but don't really have $1000 to drop on a camera. :) If I were in your shoes, I would either go with the Maxxum 7, or wait until I could afford the EOS 3 and a couple of good IS lenses.

I saw an ad in this month's Popular Photography from Royal Camera for an EOS 3 kit with a Canon 28-135 IS lens and a Canon 75-300 IS lens for $1299.99, or you can get regular Canon lenses without the image stabilization for less than $1000.

I don't know anything about Royal, but they are Pop Photo Check Rated, which means that their Secret Shoppers but stuff and rate them for customer service, etc a few times a year.
 
Every set up you mentioned is great. Don't go crazy over the gear; the truely important stuff is in your head.

Don't go for #3. No matter how cool the body is, no lens makes it a paper weight.

What's wrong with your old system? Option #5: Spend the $600 to $700 on film and processing, and I guarantee your photography will be better than if you spend it on a fancier camera.

There is nothing wrong with Minolta lenses. Canon lenses are fine too; if there really were a significant difference in quality, Minolta wouldn't survive, and we'd all be buying Canon.

You said "i want to shoot slides as you get better res. i lean more on the nature side of photograpy and old broken down farm house's that sort of stuff ." Have you considered medium or large format? That'll get you some serious res, and there are options that can get you started in the $600 range.
 
I have owned 2 great Minolta Camera's in the past and had great result with their standard lenses. I recently upgraded to an Elan 7E because the 7000's AF isn't as fast, and as a glasses wearing person i like to have AF to back me up. Though i am still mastering my Canon and love it very much, i got much better pictures with my Minolta. I don't think nessesarily that its the cameras fault, i am just not as comfortable with it yet.
The one thing that bothers me though is the metering, it sucks! I will soon be investing in a spot meter to fix that problem however. I however didn't have any lenses other then the standard one that came with the Minolta, so switching wasn't difficult.
Bottom line, if you got Minolta stuff, why not stick with Minolta, they make great bodies, as does Canon and Nikon, but you are the one that makes great pictures.
 
No need to change systems unless you feel you must. It's the lenses that count, not the camera anyway. Minolta makes some good ones. Get a better lens if you want and upgrade the body later. The Maxxum 7 is a hell of a camera and as good as any in the same price range.
 
ditto everyone's comments.

the only problem i foresee with owning minolta equipment is the lack of available minolta gear for rent. i believe all shops rent out only canon and nikon gear for the most part.

sean
 
after actually getting to play with the maxxium 7 i would have to ask 1 question
do you need all the extra bells and whistles that it comes with? i u do them it could easily compensate for the lack of lenses
 

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