Minolta Freedom Vista Redux
This is my second Minolta Freedom Vista, the first one I had was stolen with a few other items from my vehicle. This one is every bit as beat up as that one was but despite the weathered look it performed well. I do need to find and remove all the little fibers that must be around the edge of the film mask as they show up on every image. The defining feature of this camera is of course its ability to shoot panoramic images with its 24mm lens. The caveat being that it can not be used to create anything other than panoramas. Having this sole purpose though allowed Minolta to provide it with a nice large viewfinder dedicated to the effort, and it makes composing with such a different aspect ratio fun. That aspect ratio is a wide 2.6:1 which falls among various widescreen cinematic ratios.
The lens on the Freedom Vista is a 24mm f4.5 with five elements. It’s only at the outer edges where the chromatic aberrations really show themselves which is amazing considering how thin the camera is and how close to the film plane this places the lens.
So in summary composing with this camera offers some small opportunity to try your hand at creating unique compositions and the large single purpose viewfinder is superior to any other point and shoot that offers a panoramic mode.
