Lomography Fisheye 2 Camera Review – Family Vacation – By Alex Vye

I acquired  the Lomography Fisheye 2 a coupe of years ago when a colleague came to my cubicle (unfortunately, in real life I am a cubicle-dwelling software developer) and said “Aren’t you the camera guy?”, I said, “maybe”, and she gave me the camera and a bag of expired lomography 400 colour film, and walked away. The bright pink casing isn’t my style, but the price was right.

The Lomography Fisheye 2 is a plastic 35mm fisheye lomography camera. The lens is a 170° wide-angle 10mm fixed-focus f/8 lens. The shutter has a speed of 1/100 or a bulb setting. It comes with a built-in flash, powered by a AA battery.

The camera lacks a tripod screw on the bottom, which makes the bulb function rather pointless. There is a switch on the front of the camera that allows double exposures by allowing multiple shutter presses without advancing the film.

Usage

Using the Lomography Fisheye 2 is fun, period. Lightweight, simple and nigh indestructible, it’s a great camera to have with you on unpredictable adventures. Drop it on concrete? You might scratch it’s pretty pink case. Drop it in water? Pffff, dry it off, change the film, and take more shots.

I love the intimacy of the Lomography Fisheye 2. It allows you to take those close-up, in your face, one-handed shots. It’s small and light enough to fit in a jacket pocket without noticing it.

The Lomography Fisheye 2 wide angle lens really works for scenes like the X-wing fighter below, especially in crowds. It allows you to capture the whole scene without standing so far back that people walk in front of you.

The nice thing about a fixed-focus lens is that you don’t have to worry about stopping and focusing. Stormtrooper walking by? Quickly pop up the camera and press the shutter button. Who needs to focus?

I love the grainy, washed out 70s feel to the photos.These are not the droids you are looking for.

Pictures like the one below with my daughter are what the Lomography Fisheye 2 was made for. Tight, busy alleyway, no problem for the fisheye!

The Lens

The Lomography Fisheye 2 has a plastic, fixed-focus lens. You will not get pin-sharp photos. Even in bright light, as shown below, there is a softness and grainy quality to the photos. These photos were taken with (very) expired 400 lomography film, but I have used the same film from the same batch in a Nikon FE and got very sharp photos.

Being a fisheye lens, you do get vignetting, but I feel it is  nice effect. Under sunny conditions you get a nice silver vignette. If your subject has the sun in it, you can get a nice flare effect.

Construction

The construction is cheap. The button for opening the back-up to load film sticks and is difficult to work sometimes. The Lomography Fisheye 2 comes with a cheap plastic strap that easily breaks off.

The viewfinder is a bulb-shaped add-on that sits in the accessory shoe. One negative is that it pops out and is easy to lose. I lost mine somewhere in the Atlanta airport on the way to Disney. It doesn’t really matter… just eyeball your subject and remember because you have a fisheye, you have to be very close.

For some reason there is a small crab decoration on top of the camera. Maybe because it’s supposed to be a fun, beach camera?

Summary

Well, it’s a toy camera. You are  not going to be published in the National Geographic with any of your Lomography Fisheye 2 shots. But who cares. Photography for me is about adventure, exploration, and general derring-do. The Lomography Fisheye 2 let’s me take memorable fisheye pictures with no stress of losing or destroying an expensive camera.

The Lomography Fisheye 2 may be found on ebay for between $40-$50 as of this writing. For that price, it is worth it, but I wouldn’t pay much more. It can be found in other colours such as black and white.

Alex Vye

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