Minolta Dynax 9 – The 24 Year Wait for a Camera I had Put to the Back of my Mind

This is perhaps a familiar story to photographers over the age of 40. I started taking pictures in the pre-digital era. The first camera that was my own was a Canon Snappy 20* – a delight of 1980s industrial design in bright red and grey plastic. I loved that camera, I took it everywhere. Later on, when my parents decided to move up to the exciting world of autofocus (a Pentax SFXn), their Pentax Spotmatic F came to me. It’s not exactly the family silver, but I’ll never part with it.

I invested into the M42 system and put together a good selection of lenses.  I was very happy with my set up until round 1996 when I was swayed by advertising and bought a Canon EOS 50e with “eye tracking”, which was’t as magical as it was made out to be, but I digress.

Then in 1999 the Minolta Dynax 9 was released and I wanted one. I wanted one A LOT.

There was just one small problem: It’s 1999, I’m a student on a LEA grant and the retail price of £1299 is more money that I could possibly imagine ever having; but that body, those lenses and the top shutter speed of 1/12,000th of a second (a mechanical feat of engineering not yet surpassed other than with electronic shutters) was too much to handle. The GAS was real.

I had to put it to the back of my mind, and so I soldiered on with my Canon. I traded the 50e for a EOS 5, then in 2008 I traded it all again for an EOS 350D. I’d gone digital. I was all-in; no more film, no more processing, no more darkrooms… this was the future and it was magnificent.

Skip forward a decade and a half and I’m back into buying film cameras and at the top of the shopping list was the Minolta I could never afford. In the same way we used to use the internet to escape the real world, I’m finding time spent in the real world a lot more preferable to scrolling, scrolling, scrolling on whatever app is popular at the moment. Coming back to film with its slow process and no instant gratification has been a revelation and relaxing. 

I found a body only with a manual on eBay for £175. Much more reasonable. Paired with the a short zoom and a 50mm prime, I finally had the set up I’d wanted all those years ago and it absolutely does not disappoint. The build quality is excellent (perhaps to its detriment; after years of using plastic Canon DSLRs then a Panasonic GX80 m/43 compact, this thing weights a tonne**) The weight doesn’t bother me too much, it adds to the sense of purpose to the experience. 

Everything works exactly as it should. The only gripe I have is the speed / aperture read-out in the viewfinder is incredibly dim, essentially invisible in anything other than darkness. According to several forums this is a known issue. Up until the early 2000s you could send it in and it would be repaired, however now Minolta is naught but a name in the history books that’s no longer possible. It’s not all bad news, the same data can be read on the LCD on the top plate of the camera. It’s a bit of a faff, but better than nothing.

I’ve read that the material the grip is made of has a tendency to degrade and turn into a sticky mess as is the way with ageing plastics. Thankfully the one I have shows no signs of that yet.

The first roll I put thought it was some Kentmere 400. I was astounded by the speed and accuracy of the auto-focus. I’ve never had this thing hunt for focus. It’s quick, it’s precise. It’s not Canon USM whisper quiet… but you can’t have everything. The frames all came out exposed correctly. The 14 segment metering does an impressive job even in awkward scenarios. I have yet to put that maximum top speed to any meaningful test, but it’s nice to know it’s there, should the need arise.

I took it out on a day trip to Tintern Abbey, loaded with some very expired (2009) Ilford HP5+ which I pushed to ISO 1600. The exposures were good, the processing and scanning… well that’s debatable and that’s on me.

I’ve had the Dynax 9 for about a year now and I’m very glad I finally have one. Is it my go-to for taking everywhere? No, it’s too heavy for an every day sling it in a pocket camera – for that I have a nice little Yashica point and shoot I found in a charity shop for a tenner. I’m very much enjoying being back with film and the camera I wanted.

It’s likely probably on borrowed time as these things weren’t designed to last this long. I’m sure Minolta back in it’s heyday saw this as a stepping stone into a professional line of digital cameras which where never truly realised before being acquired by Sony – who apparently went on to do quite well for themselves. 

Thanks for reading and if you would like to see more pictures, not necessarily taken with the Dynax and not necessarily taken on film (I’m also a Fujifilm fanboy) you can find me on Instagram @not_necessarily_analog

*I wish I still had it, but it was lost to time.

**Actually it’s just shy of 1Kg without a lens.

You can find a detailed review of the Dynax 9 here on 35mmc

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