Although Olympus dominated the Half Frame market, they didn’t have a free run. Many a Japanese rival producing their take on the format. But only one is arguably one of the most beautiful cameras ever made. And that camera was the only half frame compact of that era to be copied by the soviets
But what made the Soviets copy her ? And why has it partially usurped my PEN EE-2 from being my favourite half frame ?
Continue reading A Petite Love Affair – Konica EYE ReviewRecently I got my grubby hands on the American Windsor and took her to the our local music Festival. Before you get worried that I’ve a Summer run in the Tower coming up, I am of course talking about a Diana Clone called the Windsor Camera.
I loaded it up with the new Kosmo Foto Mono 120. But all did not go to plan thanks to the camera,
Continue reading Dirty Diana Goes To the FairThis Year’s Poundland Challenge has flung up some excellent high end cameras for erm… a pound (or less). This is not one of them. Any Poundland Challenge always features a few from the lower end of the market. But that does that necessarily mean awful ?
Today’s plastic lo-fi comes courtesy of Concord Camera Corp. Also known as the Vivitar IC 100. It has attracted the tag of being the Poor Guy’s LC-A but is that deserved ?
Continue reading The Fun From Bao’an – Le Clic FS30 ReviewAfter a run of not so cheap cameras, I thought I’d better get back to basics with another Poundland challenge 2019 camera. In brief that challenge set out to find what you could buy for a quid and although we’ve had several high end cameras including the MZ-5 SLR, I’d rightly assumed that we’d be faced with several fixed focus plastic numbers.
But this no frill plastic flash camera doesn’t hail from Haking, Hanimex or Concord. This one’s a Minolta and it’s not good.
Continue reading You Get What You Pay for – Minolta F25 reviewI’m not accustomed to legendary elite high end compacts. But sometimes the precursor to them fall my way such as this early Yashica T* series. Whilst it still has a cache it’s a fraction of the cost of the later models. This means it can be bought for the price of a couple of non discounted domino’s Pizzas
But was it a slice of heaven or destined to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
Continue reading Prelude to the Bling Boys – Yashica T AF One roll ReviewUsually when I review an SLR I tend to caveat my reviews by pointing out optical performance depends on the Lens glass and don’t focus on that side of things. But with this Ukrainian beast it really is all about the glass in the form of the Helios-81N ( гелиос-81н )50mm 1:2 lens.
But let’s not ignore the camera and we’ll begin there.
Continue reading It’s All About The Lens Baby – Kiev 19 Review Part 1The eagle eyed amongst you will have remember as well as the Halina Super-Mini I recently reviewed, I’d also picked up the flash version. But this offers exposure control as well as the built in flash. And Hey it actually is a museum piece !
Does that make things any better ?
Continue reading Stuck in the MIddle ? -Halina Super-Mini FlashBeen a busy few weeks both photography and in life. I’ve realised the regular update is becoming a a bit irregular and given it’s almost 2 months since I last did one so say farewell to the analogue week and step inside from the rain to the warmth of the Analogue Arms and grab a pint or coffee from the bar as I give you a run down of what I’ve been up to and some other news that’s worth follow
Continue reading The Analogue Arms – Storm BrewingCar boots are often is bit hit and miss for the cheap camera hunter. I’ve scored some great wee finds over the years from my £3 XA, a K1000 for a £5 that I sold on to my mint £2 Espio 120SW. But at times you find nothing but the odd instamatic and true tat. The bank holiday weekend on in Dumfries however flung up a grubby mju zoom 105(aka ∞ Stylus Zoom 105) for two quid that literally worked for one roll and then died.
Was it £2 quid well spent despite this ?
Continue reading A Quick Dirty Booty Call – The Olympus Mju Zoom 105 Review“Hello Q. Got any special gear for this mission for me? “.
Q looked and sighed.
“After you crashing the Aston and losing the laser beam Rolex in the midst of the current austerity squeeze not so much. What happened to the rocket Launching Nikon by the way ?”
“Boom and bust Q”
“But anyway” said Q handing him a Halina Super-Mini.
Continue reading The Spy Whose Spending was Reviewed – The Halina Super-Mini 88 Review
