I did not think I would enjoy working with these sorts of cameras. Sort of like how I felt about the RETO Ultra Wide & Slim, the LOMO APPARAT is a simple-use camera centred around an ultra-wide angle lens. But the APPARAT has some other tricks that the RUWS does not have; first, there’s a built-in flash, and second, this camera is far bigger than RUWS. Like all Lomography cameras, it’s centred around making photography fun, abandoning the traditional ideas of sharpness and accuracy. Shoot from the hip and see what happens. But you can quickly determine the different quirks. The APPARAT gives the photographer.Read More →

We’re used to modern multi-element, multi-group lenses regarding optics. But it hasn’t always been that way; some of the earliest cameras used only a single element. But this often caused quality issues, so adding a second element limited the effects of chromatic and spherical aberration. The earliest applications of these Achromat lenses were in telescopes that trace back to the 18th Century. But Charles Chevalier’s (a noted name in early photographic optics) creation of his Daguerrotype Achromat lens changed the face of photography in those pioneering days. While Chevalier’s lenses are still sought by modern wet and dry plate photographers for us who shoot film,Read More →

The original slow film offering from Lomography and one with a great name, Fantome! I had initially thought that I wouldn’t jump on these right off the bat. However, after seeing some early results, I decided to give this slow offering a try. And don’t let the slow speed concern you; you can quickly shoot this film handheld on bright sunny days, although unlike last months film, I did shoot a roll on a tripod to see how well it handled long exposure. Fantome 8, like Babylon 13, is a repurposed ORWO film. ORWO DP31 is a positive archival duplication film designed to produce duplicatesRead More →

Suppose a singular camera relaunched the love of film photography and sparked the inspiration of hundreds if not thousands of photographers. That camera is the LOMO LC-A. While this particular camera is not an LC-A, it is, in the proper fashion of the original LC-A, a direct successor and continuation on the inspiration given by that fateful day in 1991, but more on that later. The LC-A+ is Lomography’s answer to providing the classic look that gave the latter days of the Soviet Bloc rich saturated colours and heavy contrast. First released in 2006 after the closure of the original LOMO production lines for theRead More →

One of the film community’s biggest photography trends is the use of speciality motion picture films for regular photographic applications. You saw the rise in popularity in films such as Eastman 2238 and Fuji 4791. Well, Lomography jumped onto the bandwagon with a pair of releases last year. Both were rerolled films from Filmotec/ORWO. The second release of these films came in Babylon 13, with Lomography publishing times for shooting at ASA-12. Having ordered the traditional five-pack, I found that the film, in reality, if ORWO DN21. As the name suggests, DN21 is a duplicating film, acting as an inter-negative between a master positive andRead More →

These days it seems that photography Kickstarter campaigns are a dime a dozen. But the company with the most number of wins under their belt is Lomography. Say what you will about them, they can deliver on their promises. Sometimes it might take a swift kick in the rear-end to get them moving, but they do move. Now I’ve shot a fair number of Lomography films, most are re-rolled and rebranded. Of course, they also encourage production of other film stocks, such as their Berlin and Potsdam films that are both rebrands of ORWO N74 and UN54 films. But they also produce some wild falseRead More →

It seems that Lomography is starting to branch out from their usual suppliers. After the release of their Kino line last year with Berlin and Potsdam, which are in fact rebranded (and in the case of the first run of Berlin, re-spooled) ORWO N74 and UN54 respectively it is no surprise that this year they released two new films in their Kino line. But these weren’t the usual fare that I’ve seen from Lomography, it seems they to have jumped on the Ultra-Low bandwagon and release two slow films. The first release, Fantomé is an ASA-8 film with lots of contrast and second is BabylonRead More →

No strangers on this bridge, Lomography Potsdam 100 is the second film released in their Kino series of films. Potsdam 100 is ORWO UN54 a film that I have shot a lot with for the past several years. Compared to N74, UN54 is super sharp, fine-grained and has a fantastic tonality and one I have only developed in a limited number of developers, so I’m looking forward to trying it out in different developers. Designed as Eastern Europe version of Kodak Plus-X and it certainly shows. What struck me is that the film is marked as Lomography Potsdam in the rebate area, which means thatRead More →

Taking a look at one of the most sought after films from Lomography, their Purple line of Colour film brings back a similar look to the colour infrared films like Kodak Areochrome. But despite the Chrome in the Name, Lomochrome Purple XR is a colour negative film. Well, enter Purple XR, which can be shot at three different speeds to produce different results. Sadly I only had one roll thanks to the Emulsive Secret Santa, so why not shoot 12 frames for each speed have the roll processed as usual and see what happens! If you also note, I’ve had to come up with differentRead More →

Found in a dusty warehouse, based on where the film came from, Sweeden, Lomography promoted their Berlin 400 as an iconic cinematic film. 400-Speed, Black & White, and from East Germany. Well, that certainly narrowed it down to only one film, thankfully it is one that I did have planned to review at a later date, so why not discuss it under the Lomography Brand! The film, if you haven’t already guessed is ORWO N74, which made collecting developing formulas easy. Shooting cinematic film in still cameras is nothing new, at least for me, I still love shooting Double-X for urban work, so getting intoRead More →