Konica Big-Mini BM-201

A charity shop find that i came across about a month ago. As you probably know, i am not a point and shoot camera fan so it was a buy-to-sell buy in order to further fund my passion for cameras.

This camera comes from the early '90s, and it was targeted at the same lucrative sector of the higher-end point and shoot compact cameras. The big mini resulted in good sales and there are a number of different versions depending on whether they have data-back or not and different aesthetics. All of them share the same very nice lens, a 35 f/3.5 consisting of four elements in four groups. There is also an upper Big-Mini F with a 35 f/2.8 lens but it is not that common and it usually fetches a lot more.

The camera is a bit on the bigger side and the noise that it makes while switching on and taking the picture is probably the biggest disadvantage. Both my EOS 5 and Dynax 9xi are far more quiet than this little monster. Another thing that left me wondering is the shutter button, it wasn't always as responsive as other

Robert Frank with a Big-Mini

P&S cameras. On the positive side, the camera is packed with the usual flash modes and a very useful +- 1.5 stop exposure compensation. Clearly, the biggest advantage of this camera is the very nice lens, the pictures i got from it are very nice overall but to my untrained eye, they seem to lack the contrast of the Yashica T4 or Nikon L35AF.

There are a few reports on the Internet, regarding the rather fragile way the ribbon cable is attached through the back door hinges to the camera. This is something to inspect when buying one of these because apparently there are quite a few that have presented this problem and makes the LCD and the MODE buttons that are situated on the back of the camera, inoperative. And by the way, those little buttons on the back is a real pain to press....

Conclusion

There are some pictures on the Internet with Robert Frank taking a picture with one of those and despite the common knowledge that Robert Frank shot the majority of his well known work with a Leica, not Konica, the Big Mini seems to me to be fetching at this point in time a price tag that i find difficult to justify. I sold mine for £40 which by no means i think is reasonable. I know that i am heavily biased towards SLR's but think what £40 could get you; pretty much any standard 50mm lens will probably outperform the little Konica and the SLRs will offer more versatility. Of course if compactness is your number one priority then sure, why not... otherwise i would suggest you look elsewhere until the prices start dropping to a more reasonable level.

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