Lets be honest I wasn’t impressed by the flashback ONE35 when it arrived. Much of my frustration related to the app and server stuff which for some reason seemed to have been rushed last minute. These are working better and I decided to give it a second chance but head to head with it’s key lo-fi digital rival, the Camp Snap, as well as a lo-fi film alternative.
A wee disclaimer. None of the companies asked me to do this. The cameras are all ones I bough for myself. Camp Snap did approach me to try 2 test filter firmwares as detailed here but I wasn’t paid by them for that and those aren’t used here.
Both our digitals are simple P&S cameras which have next to no controls (only flash) and have no screen or menu options. This helps you worry less about the results and gives more of film feel.
Let’s look at our contenders. The titles link to my reviews.
The Camp Follower – Camp Snap
Camp Snap was originally developed for American kids to take to summer camp. It was intended to remove them from focusing on settings and endlessly reviewing photos as well as being cheap so you didn’t mind if they lost it running from the camp serial killer.
It is the simplest of the cameras but does come with a 4Gb card enough to capture up to 2000 images of your camp stalker with its 8MP sensor. It’s an established company now with current models being at least a second generation.
The New Kid – Flashback ONE35
From the land down under comes the flashback. It promises a immersive disposable camera like experience. You get 27 shots before you have to digitally unload it and reload i. At this point 2 films exist a colour and B&W but these could be expanded. You down load the images from the camera to an app and then send on the cloud to get them developed which takes 24-48hrs. You can’t develop 2 rolls at the same time
The app and server had issues at launch as did some users cameras as you can see by my original review. The app and server issues are now largely resolved with the app being being available on both Android an iOS official app stores.
Old Skool – The Cylo 35mm
And for completeness lets add in a cheap 35mm plastic Fanatastic. Coming in a cheeky £12.99 in TK Maxx last year this was Britain’s cheapest new high street film camera costing less than a disposable (but without the film. It no longer is listed on cylo’s website.
Nigh identical to the LensFayre Snap LF-35M, this is no frill bar a flash. A single aperture and shutter match the fixed focus single element plastic lens. But you can stick in any film you like.
Turns out the flash is munted on mines so not quite the bargain I thought….
Round 1 – Core Spec
These cameras don’t always come with a detailed spec. On testing I’ve a range and I’ll list these in italics but please treat these as unconfirmed
| Camp Snap | Flashback ONE35 | Cylo 35mm | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sensor | 8MP | 4.4MP output | Film |
| Storage | Micro SDHC (4Gb inc) | Built in Unknown | 35mm Film |
| Focus | Fixed | Fixed | Fixed |
| Lens | 4.8mm 1:1.8 1 | Unknown | 28mm 1:8 |
| f/ | Fixed f/3.2 | Unknown | f/8 fixed |
| Shutter | 1/33-1/775 | Unknown | 1/120 |
| ISO | 100-800 | Unknown | Depends on Film |
| Frame Count | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Power | Built in Lithium | Built in | 1xAA (flash only) |
| Charge | Yes 600mAh | Yes | No |
| Flash | Built in burst LED light | Xenon | Xenon (if works) |
| LCD | No | No | No |
| Video ? | No | No | Really ? |
Camp Snap wins with a 8MP sensor set up and lens set up. You can swap Micro SDHC cards out (although you’ll need a screwdriver to do so with the Camp). The LED light is not great thing however but offers an additional auto setting over the on/off by the other 2.
At 4MP the Flashback has no core features of note to take it’s rivals on. It has a limit of 27 Shot before you need to sync although you can then “re-load” and reuse in a digital equivalent of using a film camera.
Round 2- Extra features
The Cylo has nothing here. The Camp Snap lets you change the firmware to get a filter and has an auto option of the LCD light as well as the on/off seen on the other 2. But they’re otherwise playing runner ups here. Irritatingly it’s the only one of the 3 to lack a point for strap.
The only thing I suspect you can do with them is wedge a step up ring over their lens bezel (not tried)
The camera itself offers nothing bar a flash switch, LCD frame counter and winder. Yup you heard me right. You need to manually advance the camera to turn on or between shots. Flashback ain’t the first to offer this. The much maligned (unfairly) Yashica Y35 was similar. Here you have a thumbwheel advance which fits the disposable vibe.
Flashback – the digital D&P
That’s novel but that not the most unusual thing about this. You can’t download the shots from the camera by plugging in the USB cable. Nope you have to use an App and transfer to the phone. This seems to have improved as it was a hot mess on arrival. It took over a month on from the camera arriving to an official android play store app. You can imaging the calls to the IT guy.
For some reasons the app doesn’t process your images. It sends them to be processed on a server for some wibbly wobbly reason. Lets’ be honest a filter is being used with some AI stuff one suspects, but given my phone is about 900 million times faster than the apollo 11 guidance computer could it not do it ? Oh and you have to wait 24hrs plus for developing too !!
The app has been buggy but has been updated and seems to be running better but lots to go wrong here. Unlike the Camp Snap where you can just yank the SD card, you’re stuck if the flashback, the app, your phone or server dies.
It does however looks like they have listened however as you can now down load part rolls rather than running off the 27 shots per digital roll. There are 2 films (aka filters) at the moment-flashbackclassic, the colour one was used for testing. It aims to resemble expired Fujifilm superia. In theory the company can add additional filters for you to load from the app.
– and the Extras Winner ?
But I’ll give the Flashback top spot thanks to the fact it is slightly easier to change film type and unlike the Camp snap has a strap. I’m still not convinced about the server development process although it is pretty unique.
Round 3 – Looks
In someways the cylo and camp snap are similar at first glance with only the LED light and rear red LCD frame counter differing on the digital. They both went for the retro body shape seen in tons of current re-useable film cameras.
Colour-wise the Cylo is insipid with the ghastly green or a pink version. There are similar models that are much better styled (the LensFayre version which is all white even without its sticker cover looks way nicer). Camp snap keep it much more retro with a choice of colours in a 2-tone set up with a black top. It’s less creaky than the cylo but in fairness you don’t need to open it It also works properly. As mentioned it lacks a film strap point which is a shame.
But the Flashback I have to admit is cool. Their IT guy may have been MIA but their design team were en pointe. The brief clear was make us a camera that looked like a disposable but different and boy did they achieve that
The accent stripe works well. The camera comes in 4 versions (two Black & 2 white with different accent stripes). The winder feels like disposable and LCD counter is old skool cool.
One gripe is the grip forces your fingers too close to the lens. It is solidly built too. For some reason despite having a winder the Flashback makes a noise like it has a winder. This may be the lens moving (I doubt it) but it is over-engineering pointlessness otherwise.
Round 4 Build and aftercare
The cylo flash was broke. In fairness I likely would get a refund from TK Maxx but…
My flashback has worked camera wise as it should but you do read niggles in the Kickstarter comments. I raised issues with the company about the app on both the KS discussion and directly over a month ago. Although these seem resolved, I’ve never had contact back from the company
Unlike my experience with Camp Snap. My first camera arrived camera but wouldn’t function. I was emailed back with a personal response within 24hours with a replacement already on it’s way.
The Flashback is the better built camera but the customer aftercare is a real worry.
Round 5 – Cost
In hand the Cylo (if still in TK Maxx at £12.99GBP) is the cheapest but not by much once you add the cost of film and D&P in. It still makes more sense than a disposable. At current prices 2 rolls of ultramax and lab developing with scans will push that cost higher than the Camp Snap which offers 2000 or so shots before you need to move images of its micro SD.
Camp Snap cost £53GBP/$65USD plus postage with a 4Gb micro SD in situ. The flashback is little pricier $125AUD (about £65GBP/$82USD) before postage (a whopping $25AUD to UK)
Test Notes
All digital used standard colour settings (Flashbackclassic digital film and Camp’s newest base firmware). The Cylo was loaded with fresh Kodak Ultramax 400.
I picked Ultramaxas it’s a consumer grade film and also has a great latitude giving it a fighting chance v the digitals when exposing.
Being January in Scotland in also made sense as no Sunny 16 going to be happening. I got it right as most of the out door shots were metered at almost spot on for a f/9 1/120 with 400 ISO. On brief spell of winter sun I got it up to over EV 13.
Several shots were taken from the same point with all cameras. For reference I also shot the same image with my Google Pixel 6. I’ll list exposure details on each frame. this comparison has a few shots taken freestyle as well. It shoots at a standard 12MP in this test on standard photo preset.
Both digitals had some lag issues. It’s more noticeable on the Camp Snap due to the faux shutter sound.
Film processing was done at Analogue Wonderland with standard quality and correction. These worked out about about 6.4MP equiv for comparison sakes.
Round 6 – Final images
All the image will either open a larger version if clicked (bar the sliding compare shots) on a new page either on this site or flickr
A – The Bridge (Dull Day)
The good old suspension bridge looked like this on my Pixel. It also serves as a good comment on all image to follow so we’ll do some more close focus here. Just for clarity as a you can see in the Pixel shot it is painted in a straight forward untinted grey paint. The reason I mention this will become apparent
My Pixel shoots with a wide lens (6.81mm) here with a 82° FoV (about the same as a full frame 21mm lens and takes native 12MP images (although the sensor is 50MP). The same senor is used on all shots but is sometimes in X2 zoom mode. It is a 4:3 ratio image as are the Cylo (nuff said it’s 35mm) and the Camp. The Flashback uses a narrower 3:2 ratio
-Image quality (detail)
The flashback image is not as bad as I was expecting when viewed on smartphone or as 6×4 print size on screen but zoom in and you’ll see a softness not helped by the resolution compared to the Camp. In fairness these are shown by a percent cut of whole image (10%) not matching pixel size
Detail preservation is not good compared to the Camp. The rails are sharper and you can see the mortar lines in the stone wall. It also trumps the film shot as you can see below. In fairness that is a medium level Scan. It however cant hold a candle to the Pixel 6 shot.
Go off centre and things fallaway rapidly with the Flashback. The film camera has a degree of this too. And in fairness to the flashback a cheap disposable will have more like it does.
The Flashback and the Cylo look like they suffer from pincushion distortion. I’m not sure if that’s the lens on the flashback or part of the processing filter to give a film feel. However my Pixel 6 has a mild case of it as well. we’ll see that distortion later
-Colour balance
The Camp Snap has a slight blue predominance but not awfully bad. It isn’t always present and I don’t know if some processing is being done to add emphasis to the sky. It’s much less noticable on this shot taken on the same day
The FlashbackClassic film is meant to resemble expired Fujifilm superia but to be frank it looks like expired Lomochrome purple
And they all have that cast.
A simple edit of a flashback image (here in just MS photo app) gives a more authentic image is a bit blue.
One can only hope we get that ‘film’ filter tweaked or others available. The B&W film type is better nuanced but perhaps makes the lens weakness more obvious.
Meanwhile the film camera does a good job here helped by the wide latitude Ultramax which also balances colours pretty well. There maybe is a subtle red/brown bias but not by much as you can see in the below head to head with the smartphone image below. It feels like film versus the modern image processing of my smartphone.
-Exposure
Camp Snap and Flashback both expose Okay here.
But there is no challenge in this light. It also is an almost perfect match for the Cylo fixed everything which shoots at a EV 100ISO of 11.
B- The Bridge (Bright mid afternoon winter)
With brighter conditions we got the same colour issues but more intently . From an exposure POV there was a slight over exposing issue with Flashback. I’ve found this in a few shots. The Camp Snap does a good job overall bar that tint that is way worse here.
The Cylo roll was done and dusted before this exact good spell but I had shot a similar shot before on an earlier roll. Once again the Ultramax does a great job. It also illustrates the excellent latitude of that film
C- The Brother (aka the near shot)
Close shot time with Blues Brothers. This about 1.5m out and on the dull day. The results were broadly the same on a the sunny afternoon
Much of the issues above apply here out with image quality. I’d say the Camp snap is a little underexposed v the Flashback but colour balance is way off with the flashback.
The film shooting Cylo does well here and seems sharper with the white building and the white van in the car park in front. The colour balance is better too. But as we’ll see that’s not the whole story.
But zoom in and you get a different story. None are as good as the smartphone crop but the flashback wins out on the Blues Brother from a detail POV.
D – On the bridge
Last of the bridge shots for a while !! Nice to see the reference has some radial distortion
I seem to have tilted in some of these (it is a suspension bridge). Once again to a lesser extent the Camp snap underexpose. And I’d say the the Camp Snap has less radial distortion than the Flashback, Cylo and my phone.
E – The Frothy Biker
A recurrent feature on this blog. Here aiming to try and get a little colour in on a dull day
The Camp Snap edges the Flashback again. The blue is less intense here. But again the film camera give the better image from a colour perspective and a clinically sharper image. however the Flashback wasn’t setting out for that.
There’s certainly a retro feel to the flashback but it blows the sky up badly unlike the other cameras.
F – Inside the Biker
As you’d expect the Googles image processing cuts in with HDR to give a balanced shot both of inside and through the window an impressive feat of Dynamic range aided and abetted by HDR.
No holding out such range with the rest. But actually they both did better than I expected. The Flashback is blown outside and a bit underbaked inside
But the Camp Snap was a surprise bar my finger getting in the edge (although not as badly as on the Flashback). It’s actually okay and the blue cast has lessened. It can’t hold a patch to my smartphone or a modern proper digital in terms of dynamic range but it does way better than the Flashback
The Cylo gets the exposure right outside but but inside is under exposed. It’s fixed exposure likely perfectly matched the outside but the film couldn’t carry the likely 4+ stops lower inside.
G- Natural light indoors
This is a hard shot to pull off. But the Camp is crisp and on the money exposure as well as colour balance. Grain is more noticeable however as this is the first shot with an ISO of 800.
The Flashback isn’t awful but has that colour cast and all it’s foibles. It is a little underexposed. This is however very film looking for once.
As for Cylo getting a shot which is 5 to 6 stops slower than its fixed exposure allows was huge ask. The images just failed.
G-Flash
The Cylo’s flash had failed so no shot from it.
H- Night Shooting
The camp snap puts in an effort but it does underexpose as we’re at the limits of what it can do.
The Flashback also has the same issues along with the less clinical image qualities and that filter. But if you look closely there are bandings on the image . I’ve found this on all low light shots
Other rivals ?
The obvious Lo-Fi digital rival is the Paper shoot. You might ask why it’s not here ? Well there are a few reasons. Firstly the current 20MP model cost over twice the costs of the Flashback. Secondly my one is a 13MP and I’m sorry dear reader I’m not inclined to get the new one.
It arguable even with the 13 MP would be a winner as it produces technically quite good images with some individual flair with 4 filters (up to 20 with an expansion micro SD card including some film ones). It has Eco cred, changeable fascia and a standard download to PC/take the card out. It’s now well established but is very trendy and perhaps over pricey
Likewise the Yashica Y35 is not here. Technically the New Yashica still lists it as a product. But I’ve not seen stock of the camera on their site in a long time. And at $1,880 (about £190GBP/$240USD). For that you get just one physical digifilm (these are swappable APS like cartridges that essentially have a filter encoded). Even I’d agree it’s not worth the money but yet it is really quite interesting from a lo-fi digital PoV
What About used ?
And of course there the buy a retro digital P&S argument. There was a time you could pick up a 10-20 year old digi camera for the price of can of you favourite soda but those days are gone as Gen Z has decided to embrace those That said for 10-20 quid and rarely less you can still get something of use.
Final thoughts on Flashback V Camp Snap
I have to start by giving credit to the Cylo. A plastic hunk of only partially working junk it may be. But it provided better images than the flashback in good light and had better colour balance than our digital pretenders. It’s soft at the edges and has obvious flaws from its single element plastic lens, but it did as well as I expected bar the knackered flash (grrr)
But by the time you’ve shot and paid for processing for 3 rolls of colour film in the Cylo you buy either the flashback or Camp Snap.
And our real battle is between our 2 lo-fi digitals.
Camping it Up
The Camp Snap started out as a Summer camp option. It’s cheap, reliable and takes good clinically images for what it is. Out of the box it cans store up to 2000 images on the provided SD card which you can swap out Even the LCD light which I did not have high hopes of did better than the Flashback in test. The sensor copes with most conditions and does better in dynamic range although it is not up to the standards of current smartphones. Customer support is good too.
There are some niggles. The lack of camera strap point and the blue cast in some images. It also produces quite clinical images having less distortion than even the Pixel 6 at times although no where as sharp or dynamic. It has less fall off to the edges compared to the Cylo and Flashback.
Jumping Jack Flashback
The Flashback does try to give a film effect. It has the same distortions you’d find on a cheap disposable. You get quite soft images and was the worst on test from that perspective bar the close (1.5m) shot where it’s lack of sharpening did better than the Camp.
Now that will appeal to some. But the “film” types are not quite there though and the sensor struggles and tends to bloom out bright skies. Over exposing is an issue with brighter conditions but you can find that with cheap disposables too.
The uploading to your phone thing is neat but the whole server based development causes me to worry. And Flashback ain’t helped sooth my worries. I can live with the 27 shot a roll max and the 24 Hr plus development
The fact the company failed to have either an iOS or Android app at launch (with the latter taking about 6 weeks to arrive on the Play Store) was not good. I still can’t understand why my phone can’t do the processing given I’ve apps that do the same. And this raises a serious question. If the company goes bust and their processing server goes down, there is no current way of retrieving images from the camera. And their aftercare ain’t been impressive.
So…
The Camp Snap is the more established mature option, it gives you good images in good light as you’d expect from a semi decent smartphone 5-10 years ago with some retro chic. It’s images are perhaps no different from any other digicam or smartphone but it never set out to be and if you want a cheap digital with a retro lo-fi aesthetic you can’t do any better.
The camp snap is something different but feels like a work in progress. Well built and you get way more lo-fi images but it’s deeply flawed and it’s USP may turn out to be a nightmare. But there is potential there. If the company can improve their colour film filter and tweak the app so you can save a unprocessed copy of the images it may be worth a look but for now it’s for the hardcore digital lomographer only . They also need to sort out customer support.
Camp Snap wins for now.
Other Reviews & Sources
Amateur Photography have recently reviewed the Camp Snap as have Tech Radar. The Flashback has yet to have a decent actual review outside my one, although The takeway table on TikTok has some sample images.
Wait until you see what we release in the next 6 months. Thanks for your honest reviews. Brian (camp snap engineer)
The article is engaging and informative, and I liked seeing the different images and effects each camera produces.