Sony a6700 & 500mm Autofocus Minolta Maxxum Mirror Lens with LA-EA5 Adapter - Aircraft Planespotting

Review this lens and camera combination made possible by some interesting products created by Sony and Minolta. The lens is an unusual autofocus 500-millimeter f8 mirror lens produced by Minolta in 1989, and continued in production by Sony until 2010. Sony's A-mount cameras used the mount design of Minolta, when the photography assets of Konica-Minolta were bought by Sony around 2006. This is the only autofocus mirror lens ever made for a single lens reflex camera.
Sony led the charge on mirrorless cameras that are less bulky than earlier traditional designs, and the smaller Sony E-mount was central to this change. To accommodate the many older A-mount lenses still in use, Sony devised several lens adapters to allow A-mount lenses to be used on newer E-Mount bodies, retaining automatic lens functions in many cases.
There's been some confusion about which adapters suit which A-mount lenses. We found the Sony LA-EA5 adapter worked with this Minolta Maxxum A-mount mirror lens, giving good autofocus response. Autofocus is limited to the center area of the viewfinder with this lens, but that is generally no problem for an aircraft in flight.
This full-frame 500-millimeter lens makes an effective 750-millimeter telephoto lens on an APS-C sized sensor, as with our Sony a6700 camera body. That's a lot of telephoto in a small package, made possible by the lens' mirror design technology. It's a fixed lens, so no zooming in or out. And it has a fixed aperture of f8, which is no problem for the typical daylight shooting we do for aircraft in flight.
We set the Sony a6700's ISO to Automatic, ranging between 100 and 500 ISO. The camera automatically defaults to the lowest ISO suitable to create a good exposure.
An old rule of thumb says the shutter speed for handheld photography should not be slower than the reciprocal of the lens focal length. For this effective 750 millimeter lens, as we panned with moving jet aircraft, we initially chose 1/800th of a second shutter speed, and later tested it at 1/1000th of a second. Sure, for propellers the blur is smaller than one might like, but remember, this is telephoto, where every inadvertent movement of the camera and lens shows up like gangbusters. And individual photographers have varying abilities to capture sharp action.
We approached this day at the Boise airport as if we were shooting for a magazine assignment. High-speed burst shooting in Sony RAW gave us enough images to pick and choose the sharpest. The Sony RAW files first went through Sony's proprietary Imaging Edge software where we adjusted things like exposure and sharpness. Then we quickly ran the selected images through an older version of PhotoShop Elements for further enhancements in contrast, sharpness, and exposure. On a select few images, we then employed a new tool in our software kit -- Topaz Sharpen AI. We labeled the images in this presentation that were sharpened with Topaz.
Our verdict? Not bad for our first outing with the Minolta Maxxum 500-millimeter mirror lens mounted to the Sony a6700 body. We will use this combination again this summer at an air show to see how it serves our needs.
A Minolta 500-millimeter autofocus lens can be bought on E-Bay for under $300 at the time of this video. The Sony LA-EA5 lens adapter shows up on E-Bay around $175. We like how this lens and adapter work with our Sony a6700 body. We have not tried it with any other Sony cameras. What do you think of our results? Leave your comments, below, please.
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[@fistfulloflenses]

Interesting video of a unique lens , very enjoyable

[@airailimages]

Thank you very much for watching and commenting. As you know, photography is much more than the click of the shutter. Trying out different lens and body combinations can be fun.

[@brandonneedler22]

Awesome photos!

[@airailimages]

Thank you very much for watching and commenting!

[@markloken2465]

Great video! When I upgraded from the a77II in 2019 to the a99II, I haven't looked back....the ISO performance alone, won me over...lol Thank you for your videos! I also love air shows...I look forward to the performance with this lens.

[@airailimages]

We'll have more of this season's air shows starting next month... then on to Oshkosh in July.

[@markloken2465]

@@airailimages Were you at the air show at Tinker AFB last summer? It was awesome!

[@Chilly_Billy]

I really need to get a DSLR and telephoto like this setup.

[@airailimages]

I enjoy spending time with cameras beside the runway. Hope you do too!

[@Chilly_Billy]

​@airailimages
I used to be an avid 35mm photographer but beyond a digital bridge camera a decade or so ago, I have been away from anything but cell photos for quite some time. I need to change that soon.

[@joeaverage3657]

Question. Have you had opportunity to do any Timelapse star trails with the Sony a6700???

[@RLVIDEOS2024]

Hi. What bridge camera do you recommend for video and aircraft photography? Greetings from Chile

[@airailimages]

Greetings! The only bridge camera I have used is the Sony RX10-IV. I have made some very useful video and still images with it, and I am glad to have it available.

[@RLVIDEOS2024]

@@airailimages Many thanks