Why do I have so many film cameras?

I own nearly a dozen film cameras. By contrast, I only have two digital cameras (one fixed lens and one interchangeable lens camera). To be fair, compared to other film photographers a dozen is actually pretty moderate. What is it about film cameras that makes people like me want to collect them? Do I actually use all of them, or are they just decorations sitting on a shelf? Truth is, I use all of them fairly regularly, except one I bought as inoperable because I might want to restore it one day. So what does each of these cameras bring to the table that not only makes me want to own it, but shoot with it as well? Let me run through them in the order in which I acquired them, and explain why I love each and every one, despite a few eccentricities.

Olympus Trip 35

Olympus Trip 35 (ca. 1969)

I was about to say that this was my first film camera, but of course that’s not true. Being GenX, I got my first film camera — a Yashica Palmatic 20 — when I was 12 or 13 years old, and I’ve owned various point-and-shoot film cameras since. It would be more accurate to say that this is my first film camera since becoming serious about photography.

Why I love it

The Trip 35 was a technical marvel for its time. Manufactured from 1967 through 1984 (mine was made ca. 1969), it has an electromechanical autoexposure system that automatically selects the aperture and switches between two shutter speeds, all without a battery. Everything is powered and controlled by the selenium light sensor around the lens. When there is not enough light even for the f/2.8 aperture and slowest shutter speed, a little mechanical red flag is raised in the viewfinder as you push down on the shutter. The leaf shutter is almost completely silent, only making a tiny “ping” or “tick” sound depending on whether the 1/40s or 1/200s shutter speed is selected.

This camera’s small size, autoexposure, zone focusing, and silent shutter make it ideally suited for street photography.

Pentax Spotmatic F

Pentax Spotmatic F (ca. 1974) with my collection of M42 glass.

Once I got more comforable with shooting 35mm film, I started looking for a more advanced camera. I had already purchased a couple of M42 mount lenses for my Fujifilm digital camera (along with a mount adapter), so I wanted a film camera that I could use the same lenses with. The obvious choice was the Pentax Spotmatic, which has an M42 screw mount. I specifically wanted the F because it’s the latest model before Pentax switched to the K bayonet mount (with the venerable K1000). I took a minor gamble on an eBay listing from a reputable seller, and received this camera in mint condition. Even the internal light meter is operational and accurate.

Why I love it

Even though I’ve bought a number of cameras since, the Spotmatic F is still my favorite all-around shooter. It’s fully mechanical, so I can keep shooting even if the battery — which is only needed for the light meter — gives out. Just keep feeding it film and it will keep going. The shutter goes all the way up to 1/1000s so I can safely use ISO 400 film in broad daylight. And there is a glut of inexpensive, high quality glass (among which Asahi Pentax’s own Takumar brand ranks high) that fit this camera. My own collection covers focal lengths from 28mm through 200mm. With that kind of range, there’s very little this camera can’t do, and it creates beautiful images no matter what film stock I throw at it. The SLR viewfinder is bright and clear of haze or dust, the hot shoe mount works well with my Godox Lux Jr. retro flash, and I love the handy shutter lock that keeps me from wasting frames when I’m putting the camera in a bag. It is also compact and feels really solid in the hand, with just the right amount of heft but not so heavy that it starts to weigh on my neck.

Canon EOS 10S

Canon EOS 10S (early 1990s)

A few years ago my daughter called me to say she’d picked up an old film camera at an estate sale for $35. At the time she wasn’t really into film yet, so she gave it to me for Father’s Day. It looked really clean and even came with a case and original manual, so it was definitely worth spending $12 on a battery to see if it worked. When I put in a roll of film it instantly sprung to life, automatically loading the film on the take-up spool and sensing the ISO from the DX encoding. It’s worked like a charm ever since. I eventually upgraded the included 35-70mm kit zoom to the “Nifty Fifty” 50mm f/1.8.

Why I love it

This camera is everything my Spotmatic isn’t: it has auto load, auto advance, auto rewind, 3 point auto focus, and the full complement of autoexposure modes. It’s auto everything! Although I love the meditative zone that shooting a fully mechanical camera puts me in, sometimes I just want to compose the shot and push a button, knowing it’s going to come out well. It’s on the days when I don’t want to bother with a lot of technical details that I take this camera out. It’s a joy to use; while rather large, it weighs very little and fits well in the hand. The motor makes a satisfying whirring sound on every film advance. And with a maximum shutter speed of 1/4000s it has a super wide exposure range, meaning I can shoot CineStill 800T in broad daylight, or wide open at f/1.8 on slower film, without overexposing.

Mamiya C330

Mamiya C330 Professional (ca. 1969) with 105mm f/3.5 lens pair. A TTArtisan Light Meter is mounted in the cold shoe.

After having used three (very different) 35mm film cameras for a while, I was curious about medium format. I had been playing around with framing square pictures in my digital cameras, and I loved how compositions just came together. And of course the greater detail and finer grain inherent in significantly larger negatives was another reason I wanted to try medium format. As it happened, a friend of mine was looking to sell his Mamiya C330, which shoots 6x6cm negatives on 120 film. So I decided to buy it from him.

I’ll be honest, this camera was not made for street photography; it was designed as a professional studio camera, and its bulk and heft are more suitable for tripod mounting than hanging around your neck for hours on end, even with a premium Peak Design strap. Not to mention that focusing on the fly, especially when you’re walking and trying to catch another moving person or object, is tricky to say the least, and that’s before considering that the image is left/right reversed in the viewfinder.

Why I love it

Once you get over those small hurdles, though, this camera shines! Unlike most TLR (twin lens reflex) cameras, the C330 supports interchangeable lenses, and it has a bellows that allows it to focus extremely close-up. Most copies of this camera come with the 80mm f/2.8 lens pair, but mine came with the 105mm f/3.5 installed. I tend to prefer slightly longer lenses for street photography, and the 58mm equivalent focal length is well suited to my style.

The C330’s design is incredibly well thought out. It has not one, but two shutter buttons, one each on the side and in front. The front one accepts a threaded cable release. There is a shutter lock switch to prevent accidentally tripping it. The viewfinder on top is designed for waist-level composition, but includes a small loupe to facilitate focusing, assisted by the split image focusing screen. When the bellows is extended beyond a certain point, a needle descends from the top of the viewfinder. This needle has a dual function; it accounts for parallax by indicating the “revised” top of the frame when close focusing, and it also points to a number to the left of the viewfinder that represents the bellows factor — the amount of exposure compensation to apply to make up for the extra distance between the lens and the focal plane. This all sounds like an awful lot to keep track of, but it’s really pretty intuitive. And the images it produces are stellar!

Kodak Ektar H35 half frame

RETO-Kodak Ektar H35 (2022)

Okay, this was kind of a frivolous purchase, but at $50 I was willing to take a gamble. It’s not vintage — I bought it brand new and it came in a blister pack. Can you say “cheap”? Although it’s Kodak branded, it’s actually made by a company named ‎RETO Production Limited. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what is known as a “plastic craptastic” camera!

Why I love it

Maybe love is a big word, but there are some things I really like about this camera. First and foremost, it’s a half frame camera, which means you can squeeze 72 exposures out of a roll of 35mm film. (This is also its greatest drawback, as I have yet to finish the first roll I started.) Composing is more art than science — the manufacturer decided to save a few bucks by placing a cropped screen on a landscape-oriented viewfinder instead of installing a proper portrait-oriented one — but that’s part of the adventure of shooting this thing. Since there’s no way to adjust aperture or shutter speed (they’re fixed at f/8 and 1/100s, respectively), you’ll need to pick the right ISO film for the light conditions you’re planning to shoot in (and remember, it does have a flash). Of course the lens is plastic as well, so don’t expect pin-sharp images. All of that notwithstanding, this is a fun camera to shoot, and it really does look like an old vintage job from a distance. It’s perfect for snapshots or vacation photos, and you can’t beat the cost per frame!

Holga 120N and 120Pan

Holga 120Pan and 120N (2023)

Since we’re on the topic of “plastic craptastic” cameras, let’s discuss my Holgas.

Holga is the ultimate lomography camera: it’s made entirely from plastic, including in most cases the lens, and light leaks are considered a feature, not a bug. The whole idea of lomography is to introduce a bit of artistic unpredictability into the process of picturemaking. This includes funky emulsions with explicit color casts, souping film, and yes, light leaks. Of course you can get rid of the leaks with some gaffer tape and actually end up with some fairly clean pictures. But the watchword with Holga cameras is “experimental photography”.

Like the aforementioned Kodak-branded half frame, the Holga really has no exposure control to speak of; it’s just a single switch that can be toggled between “sunny” (f/11) and “cloudy” (f/8). The shutter speed is supposed to be fixed at 1/100s but since it’s controlled by a cheap mechanical spring, it varies slightly between cameras (and likely between exposures as well). My 120N appears to be slightly faster so I’m having to compensate by about 1/3 stop. The pano version is identical to the regular one except it shoots double-wide negatives, and the lens is offset farther from the focal plane to cover the larger image area.

Why I love them

First of all, the “120” in the model number of these cameras means they use medium format film. This translates to versatility, high resolution, and low cost per roll (if not per frame). A single roll of 120 film can be divvied up in various ways, most commonly 6x4.5cm (16 exposures), 6x6 (12 exp), 6x7 (10 exp), 6x8 (9 exp) or 6x9 (8 exp). The Holga 120N shoots 6x6 natively but comes with a mask that allows 6x4.5 shooting. The 120Pan is an outlier; it shoots 6x12cm panoramic images, each taking up two regular 6x6 frames (for a maximum of 6 exposures per roll). The plastic lenses in these things are not particularly sharp, and aren’t even guaranteed not to have significant flaws, but they generally perform well, and what they lack in sharpness is somewhat offset by the higher resolution of the medium format film. I don’t know what it is, but I can spot a Holga picture from a mile away and never in a bad way. The images exude a unique character that is at once organic, warm, and surreal, evoking a weird kind of nostalgia to a time that never was. This is no doubt why Holgas are mostly popular among fine art photographers; you certainly wouldn’t want to shoot a wedding with one (although that’s been done with in some cases stunning results) but the unpredictable nature of Holga photography is what makes it beautiful, and this is impossible to faithfully recreate in the digital domain.

Ricoh KR-30sp

Ricoh KR-30sp, ca. 1985

Okay, back to the world of traditional film photography. A local camera shop was having a big vintage sale a few months ago, and I came across this little beauty from the mid-1980s. This is one of those cameras that doesn’t work without batteries, and when I asked if it was operational the seller told me he wasn’t sure, and to just take it. So, free camera! I bought some batteries and ran a roll of film through it, and the negatives came back perfectly exposed. Since then this has quickly become one of my favorite cameras.

Why I love it

First of all, it’s really compact — perfect for street photography. The 50mm f/2 lens that came with it is incredilby sharp with beautiful bokeh, which I was not expecting based on the no-frills RIKENON brand. But in the highly unlikely event I ever get tired of that lens, this camera has a Pentax K mount, so there’s a whole constellation of excellent, inexpensive glass available for it. Focusing is a breeze thanks to the large, super clean and bright split image SLR viewfinder. In terms of functionality, this camera falls right in between the Pentax Spotmatic F and the Canon EOS 10S. It has autoexposure (including program, aperture priority and shutter priority) but no autofocus or any motorized functions. The maximum shutter speed is smack in the middle at 1/2000s. It even has an exposure compensation dial — something not found on many SLRs or even DSLRs. I did learn that I have to pay more attention to the LED light meter on the right side of the viewfinder, which is rather unobtrusive even when it’s warning me about over- or underexposure. I’ve gotten some amazing images from it, and it’s a great camera to take out when I want to have full control over focus and composition without having to think too much about exposure.

Yashica Electro 35GSN

Yashica Electro 35GSN (mid-1970s)

A recent acquisition (I bought it from a generous friend for a ridiculously low $40), I finally have my first rangefinder! I’ve always wanted a rangefinder because the focusing experience is so different from any other camera. It’s challenging at first, but once you’re fully accustomed to it there’s no faster or more accurate way to focus. There’s a reason Leica has stuck with this focusing system through its many decades of making cameras, and is currently one of only a handful (and the only well-known) brands offering a digital rangefinder camera.

Unfortunately the Electro 35 was made before mercury batteries were banned, and finding a compatible power source using readily available batteries required a bit of research, but thanks to the seller’s suggestions and a vintage photography blog I was able to find a battery combination that both fits in the compartment and provides near-identical voltage. A good thing, too, because this camera will not operate at all without a battery. The two rolls I’ve shot through it so far have come out beautiful, but did alert me to the fact that due to a very slight difference in voltage between the original mercury battery and my frankenbattery, I need to overexpose by about 1/3 stop. There is sadly no exposure compensation dial, but the problem is easily solved by adjusting the ISO setting.

Made in the mid-1970s, it clearly straddles two worlds: classic rangefinder design on one hand, and newfangled electronics on the other. Exposure is fully automatic, and the only indicators are two lights for under- and overexposure, respectively (although it does not prevent the shutter from firing if either of those conditions are present). The lights do not appear to be LEDs — those didn’t really get popular until the 1980s — and I’m low-key concerned that they will eventually burn out. The weirdest feature on this camera (but a really useful one) is the battery check light and accompanying button. When neither exposure warning turns on, there’s no way to know whether that’s because exposure is within range, or the battery died. So Yashica added a button on the back that, when pressed, lights up a small bulb on the edge of the top plate to let you know that, yes, the battery is still good. Of course this means that continually checking the battery will also drain it faster.

Why I love it

It’s a rangefinder, what more can I say? Sure, it’s not a Leica, but it works incredibly well. The optical viewfinder is large, clear and bright, and the diamond-shaped focusing patch, while small, is not difficult to see and focus with. It does have its limitations, most significantly that it only shoots in aperture priority mode. Do I care? Not at all, because that’s what I shoot in 99% of the time. For a street shooter it’s actually quite large but it feels great in the hands. And that 45mm f/1.7 lens is so sharp you could cut yourself on it. It’s perfect for street and even portrait photography.

Fujifilm Instax SQ6

Fujifilm Instax SQ6 (2023)

The latest addition to my film camera collection, this is a recently manufactured camera by Fujifilm. Wait, you didn’t know Instax was analog? Yep, just like Polaroid, light directly hits an emulsion, after which the photo self-develops in a few minutes. (There are digital Instax printers out there, but all they do is pass a bar of OLEDs over the film to expose it, like an inkjet printer but with light instead of ink.) This camera was actually discontinued when I bought it, and if I had waited much longer it would have been impossible to buy new. So why is this particular model so special?

Why I love it

Who can resist the immediacy of instant film? Sure, a digital camera can show you the picture you took right away, but it’s just a fleeting image on an LCD screen. With instant film, you have a physical object that saves a memorable moment immediately after it occurs. Yes, I also have an Instax printer that can print any image I’ve taken with a digital camera or phone onto instant film. But somehow, the fact that I can make as many copies of the same image as I want makes it less special. A true analog instant print is not only immediate, but also unique. When you give it to someone as a keepsake, you’re giving them your only copy. This, in my opinion, makes it more valuable.

Fujifilm Instax actually comes in three sizes: mini, square and wide. I used to have an Instax mini printer, and the prints are really tiny — about the size of a business card, including the white border — and it’s really tough getting a decent picture out of that. On the other end of the spectrum is Instax wide — just a bit smaller than an index card, which is really a nice size to capture some detail. However, I still think the square format is best for instant. Perhaps the prevalence of Polaroid prints during my childhood has permanently wired my brain to associate instant film with a square format, but that format is also uniquely versatile. It is well-suited to portraits, which is what instant photos are primarily used for, and you don’t have to think about whether to shoot horizontal or vertical. The only downside to Instax square vs. Polaroid prints is that they’re slightly smaller. On the plus side, they’re a bit cheaper, less finicky, and they develop more quickly.

So why do I love this specific model? I looked at several instax cameras before buying this one, including the Fujifilm SQ40 and Mini Evo, and the Lomography Lomo’Instant Square Glass. I quickly dismissed the Mini Evo because it’s actually a digital hybrid camera — it takes pictures digitally and then prints them using a built-in printer. The SQ40 is true analog but does not allow for any creative control on the part of the photographer; it’s strictly point and shoot. The Lomo’Instant Square Glass is the polar opposite of that, requiring a good deal of trial and error to get the composition and exposure correct (that Pigalle Edition looks so sweet, though!) but like the SQ40 there is no way to turn off the flash. The SQ6 is the only Instax camera that lets you disable the flash and also has the widest range of shutter speeds, going all the way down to 1.6 seconds for long exposures — something I consider key in going beyond mere snapshots. The only potential drawback is that this thing is freakin’ huge!

My next film camera

At this point I really have all the film cameras I need. I certainly don’t need any more SLRs, because the Pentax, Ricoh and Canon really cover all the bases between them. But although I’m not actively looking to buy anything right now, I can imagine at some future date picking up another medium format camera, preferably one that shoots in 6x7. The Mamiya 7ii would be awesome, but who can afford that? Maybe the Mamiya RB67 or Pentax 67 if a good deal came along . . .

On the 35mm front, I would eventually like to own a higher-end rangefinder. Not a Leica (unless someone decides to gift me one, haha!) but maybe a Leica clone such as the Minolta CLE or Voigtländer Bessa R.

Conclusion

I hope that, beyond explaining why I shoot film on so many different cameras, this article has given you some helpful information about what to look for in your first (or next) film camera. None of the above cameras are very expensive, and if you’re careful and patient you can find some great deals on eBay, KEH, or similar auction/used camera sites. And don’t forget to check your local thrift store for vintage gems.

Happy shooting!