ONDU Pinhole stops making pinhole cameras to focus on large format and “other projects.”
For film photographers in the know, ONDU has been synonymous with a high-quality pinhole camera for over a decade. Unfortunately, for those who grew to love their lensless products, the Slovenian camera maker is abandoning their namesake practice.
In their recent email (thank you, Kari), Elvis Halilović announced that ONDU Pinhole will no longer manufacture pinhole cameras in order to focus on large format and “other projects.”
Understandably, the news disappointed fans of some of the best lensless cameras on the market. However, ONDU isn’t the only pinhole camera maker, and perhaps their departure will make space for other ambitious projects, like Mania MFZ (analog.cafe/comments/r336).
I messaged ONDU earlier to get a statement from them but haven’t heard back yet (will update this post if they reply).
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On Instagram (instagram.com/p/DFf3jkusN56), Elvis mentioned his desire to explore creativity in new ways. No one wants to feel stuck. Best of luck to ONDU and I’m looking forward to seeing more products from the shop.
ONDU’s latest large format camera was announced last year on Analog.Cafe. Read about it here: analog.cafe/r/film-photogr…
My favourite samples of this lens’ renderings from all the digital Leicas (amongst the M9s, the M10s, and the M11s) were made with the Monochrom body. I’m not used to digital sensor colours, even the premium ones, which is why I found black-and-white ones more compelling. Can’t articulate why just yet.
In any case, this lens appears to make sharp photos, as you’d expect from Zeiss optics that brought Yashica back out of the hole (a bit of history here: analog.cafe/r/yashica-t2-f…).
This black-and-white image seems to be pushing the lens’ limits: if you look closely, there’s some softness and swirl in the corners and a tiny bit of motion blur in the leaves. Yet the photo has a nice contrast and a great overall sharpness (there are a few things that can affect the sharpness of your photos with any lens — I wrote about it earlier here: analog.cafe/r/how-to-make-…).
Yashica’s T* point-and-shoot cameras were and are relatively affordable (thanks to the all-plastic bodies) and well-designed. Of course, the handling or reliability that you get with them won’t be the same as on a M-mount rangefinder.
Fujifilm’s new Instax Mini 99 is a fully analogue instant film camera that uses LEDs for in-camera special effects.
We’ve seen instant film printers with tiny digital sensors before from Fujifilm, Leica (analog.cafe/r/film-photogr…) and others. Though these cameras have their advantages like special in-camera effects, many film photographers just want a camera that shoots film.
Well, it appears that Fujifilm has just delivered the analogue process we crave *with* special in-camera effects. All that at an affordable price point ($200) in a package that looks nice.
The new Instax Mini 99 is an updated version of the Instax Mini 90 (analog.cafe/r/instax-mini-…) with novel exposure and focus controls.
The camera also features physical vignetting control (a mask in front of the lens). But the most interesting in-camera effect is the in-house LEDs that project colours onto film to simulate warm/cool tones, light leaks, and various colour casts.
There’s no digital processing of any kind in this camera!
Instax Mini 99 is expected to arrive in stores in mid-April.
Dmitri Jan 31, ‘25
Dmitri Dec 20, ‘24
Dmitri Mar 14, ‘24, edited on Apr 27, ‘24