Vivital Ultra Wide and Slim : Camera Review

The Vivitar Ultra Wide and Slim camera is commonly taged as the "poor man's Lomo". Its pictures resembles the ones taken from the Russian Vintage Lomo L-CA which costs around $300. I got this ultra cheepo camera at ebay for around 10 dollars. Shipping from UK to the Philippines costed me 8 dollars more. I named her "Viv" :) . This is my official entry to Epic Edit's PHOTO PROJECT: The $50 Film Camera.


Look and Feel
Viv is plastic all over. It has no flash, no batteries, ergo, manual film rewinding. Its certainly does look like a toy camera. It is also ultra lightweight and portable.

Technical Specs
It doesn't take much to learn how to use Viv. It doesn't have any options or controls, other than the shutter release button and the film advance wheel. Here are its vitals:

Film Size: 135
Shutter speed: 1/125
Aperture: f/11
Focal Length: 22mm
Focus range: 1.5m to Infinity


What I Like
Its super cheap, lightweight and portable. And what makes it great is that it takes pictures with vignettes. And if paired with a crossed-processed film, you'll get richer, wilder colors, and higher contrast results.

What I Don't Like
I find it very hard to open the film door. It usually takes me 5 tries to get a grip on it pull it open (when i'm lucky) . And since it doesn't have flash or bulb function, its only ideal for the sunny outdoors. So its use is limited. Also, for cross-processed films, the images are more grainy, especially when its underexposed.

What's Weird
The film advance wheel is placed in the lower left corner at the back of the camera. Most film camera have it on the upper right. It's a bit harder to reach wheel at bottom of the camera. I'm just saying that its less ergonomic. And why is it only available in England? and gift wrapped? -- well, it is a year ago. Just a thought :)


Sample Shots
For this project, for every shot i took from Viv, i also take one from a digital camera. I used my digital Canon PowerShot SX100 IS and set it to auto mode. I left all the photos un-tweaked so we can correctly compare the images. I used Fuji Sensia 100 film (Transparency) and have it crossed-processed. Also presented here are some shots i took from my archive from different film types. The picture on the left is from vivtar, and on the right is from the digital canon. i knew i should have set the digital to vivitar's exposure settings, but i was too lazy :p



ultra wide



you will really need a good dose of lighting to get the best shot possible.
the baby is just so irresistibly cute. :)



vivitar vignettes. richer colors. higher contrast.




In this shot, i pressed the shutter at the same time. The jeepney was probably at 40km/hr tops. Notice the in delay shutter trigger in digital cameras.



cross processing results in unexpected colors.

Here's the whole set. I've crammed up on this project that i took the last dozen shots on the way to the printers yesterday. Unfortunately, the sun didn't come up yesterday, turning my photos underexposed. See the flicker set here.

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Sets from my archive

This set was taken the day I got Viv(this camera). Loaded a Fuji YKL 100 roll (color negative) and walked through my lunch break for some test shots. It was a very sunny day. I may have done some tweaking here, but mostly adjusting the contrast and highlights. Vignettes as not as visible compared with a cross-processed film. See flickr set here.







This set was taken with Fuji Provia (i think), but i'm sure its a transparency film, and then have it cross-processed. Walked around an old school and some parks, under overcast skies. See the flickr set here.

This set was taken on a beach resort on a sunny day. I used Kodak Ektachrome -- and its now my favorite film! Its the richest color results i've got so far in using Viv. ) Flickr set here.

i have yet to try a black and white film for viv. maybe somebody can sponsor this. :D