Minolta AL

Eleven shutter speeds, a full second to 1/1000, and no battery anywhere in the body. That was the Minolta AL in 1961, and it still sums the camera up. The meter is a selenium cell that makes its own current from the light hitting it. You pick a speed, turn the aperture ring until the needle meets its index, focus with the rangefinder patch, and shoot. Nothing on the camera guesses for you.

Minolta's own company history puts the AL in July 1961 and names the shutter as an Optiper Citizen MLT, the M-12B. Its speeds follow the modern sequence, so 1/60 sits where plenty of cameras of the day still marked 1/50. The 1/1000 top speed set it apart, since most leaf-shutter compact rangefinders of the period stopped at 1/500. What that buys you is one stop. On ISO 100 film under an overcast sky or in open shade, the AL can stay at f/2 or f/2.8 while a 1/500 camera has to stop down. In full sun, sunny 16 still applies and you close the lens like everyone else.

The lens is a 45mm f/2 Rokkor-PF that stops down to f/22 and takes 40.5mm screw-in filters. Speed, aperture and a light value scale all live on the barrel, cross-coupled to the meter. Change the speed and the needle swings off its mark; turn the aperture ring until it settles back on the index. The light value scale shows you the equivalent pairs for that reading, which is handy when you want to trade depth of field for a faster speed. Film from ASA 10 to 800 can be set on the meter, so most films you are likely to buy today fit. Minolta's AL-F hands the aperture to a CdS cell and needs batteries to do it. On the AL, every choice stays yours.

Expect some weight. At about 770 g it hangs heavier on a neck strap than a fixed-lens rangefinder looks like it should, and by mid-afternoon you feel it. The payoff is a leaf shutter that stays quiet and syncs flash at every speed, right up to 1/1000, with an M-X selector for bulbs or electronic units. A focal-plane body of the same era could not sync anywhere near that fast. So the AL makes a good daylight fill camera: meter the bright background in Zone Light Meter, set the AL to match it even at 1/1000, and let a small flash lift a face sitting in shade.

Selenium is the catch. The cells tire with age and light, and some ALs turn up with a lazy needle or one that will not move at all. The shutter and lens work regardless, but the coupled match-needle system is only as good as that cell. Check any new copy against a meter you trust before loading slide film, and if the needle is dead, treat the AL as a meterless camera with a fine lens.

It gets talked about far less than the later fixed-lens rangefinders from Canon and Yashica, which is odd given what it offers. It suits someone who wants to set exposure by hand and does not mind carrying extra metal to get f/2 and 1/1000 in one body.