In the past week, two new film cameras have been announced. They are bright and bold and very much not aimed at the “serious” photographer.
There is, however, no confusion over who they are definitely aimed at – those who probably haven’t shot a roll of film before.
Their target market is those who’ve tired of shooting everything on their phone, and want something more interesting to capture their memories – and who don’t necessarily want to use a disposable.
The first of these new cameras is the Lomography Half-frame Simple Use Reloadable Film Camera. Half in film format if not in name, this is a tweaked version of the simple, reloadable 35mm camera Lomography first launched back in 2017.
The Simple Use Reloadable Film Camera came already loaded with a roll of Lomography film but it didn’t die when that roll of film was finished. You rewound the film and then loaded it with another roll from Lomography’s staple (or, indeed, from any other film brand).
The camera has been enough of a success for Lomography to occasionally relaunch it loaded with the latest addition to their film range.
The new half-frame version comes with enough film pre-loaded to shoot 40 frames, though it will of course shoot 72 frames with a standard 36-shot roll inside.
What’s more, the camera was offered for a little under £22 in the UK loaded with Lomography’s Lady Grey black-and-white film, and a touch under £25 loaded with its new colour negative film, LomoChrome Classicolor 200.
Just a day after Lomography’s announcement, Reto Project – the Hong Kong company which licenses the Kodak name across various products – announced their latest camera.
The Kodak EC35 is as bare-bones as Lomography’s Simple Use Reloadable Film Camera – manual film advance, single shutter speed and aperture, integral flash – but adds a sliding film cover like you’d find on the cult (and increasingly pricy) Olympus Mju-II.
Reto are very much aiming it at younger photographers. The camera is available in no less than seven different colours – midnight black, vanilla white, butter yellow, lavender, powder blue, blush pink, and avocado green. Reto seem to be sprinkling a touch of the marketing magic they used last year when they released probably the most talked-about camera of 2025, the Kodak Charmera.
Though the Charmera is a digital model, it oozes an analogue aesthetic. Its branding leans heavily on Kodak’s 1980s packaging, and physically it’s a doppelganger for Kodak’s first disposable, the 110-toting Fling. Reto also offered it in a range of styles and colours – in blind-box packaging which meant you didn’t know when version you’d got your hands on until you opened the box.
Some of the Charmera marketing magic seems to have sprinkled on the Kodak EC35. Granted, you know what colour you’re getting before you rip open the packaging, but that range of colours is a simple but effective decisions. The EC35 is seven different cameras, depending which model ticks your colour chart.
And the price? In the UK, a smidgen under £35, the prices of a three-pack of colour film.
The Half-frame Simple Use camera, meanwhile, adds the idiosyncracy of half-frame to one of Lomography’s smartest simple cameras. Half-frame used to be a relic of film photography’s past – in the last few years it has become contemporary again. The Kodak Ektar H35N (another Reto product) appeared just as film prices were on their uppers; the two-for-one format chimed with the frugal times.
When the Pentax 17 – the first new film camera to come from this major Japanese camera producer in nearly two decades – appeared in 2024, half-frame was no longer a half-forgotten format.
Colour film isn’t as hard to find as it was during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, but it’s expensive enough that it’s no longer an effortless purchase; there will be plenty of people interested in eking out a roll as long as they can. Twice the photos on a roll of film? Hard to say no to.
The Lomography Half-frame’s appearance seems to have been particularly welcomed; an initial review from the UK’s veteran photography magazine Amateur Photographer by John Stapley has been particularly enthusiastic: “I loved having the freedom to experiment without worrying that I was burning through the film too fast.”
Now, the purists might complain that both these cameras are new arrivals in an already crowded field of simple cameras (like the Dubblefilm SHOW, Moment camera, and any number of other cheap Chinese cameras). Others might point out that you can get a used simple camera for much cheaper from a car boot sale or browsing eBay.
Both these views are valid, but they overlook the fact that two established brands think that there’s enough interest in film that it’s worth their time, money and effort to introduce new cameras aimed at an often fast-moving market.
Despite a sizeable increase in digital camera sales over the last 18 months, enough young photographers are swerving digital entirely in their flight from their phones, and choosing to experiment with film. Whether you’re a Lomographer or a Leica lover, that’s good news.
I'm a New Zealander who has been living in London since the mid-1990s, shooting film seriously since the year 2000. Kosmo Foto was launched in 2012 and has since become a film brand, with the release of my first films Kosmo Foto Mono 35mm (2017) and Kosmo Foto Mono 120 (2019).
I’m doing everything I can to promote film photography in the 21st Century, and help it survive and thrive. If you want to write something for Kosmo Foto, please drop me a line at foto.dowling@gmail.com.
