This Cheap Reusable Film Camera Takes Really Great Photos
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If you’re new to film photography, the best way to get oriented is to start with something easy and cheap. Disposable 35-mm. cameras have typically filled this need, but many who try them find the resulting images too plain or unusable. Shots are often out of focus, underexposed, or simply lacking in the character they expected from the film experience. I recently came upon a camera that takes the low-stakes ease of a disposable and adds just enough character to make shooting actually fun and your pictures come alive.
The Reto Ultra Wide and Slim is a plastic 35-mm. camera that costs $30, is very small, and weighs almost nothing. There are no controls to speak of aside from the shutter button and a winding mechanism — it’s the very definition of basic. What makes it fun is the lens, which is, as the name implies, very wide. With a 22-mm. focal length, it captures a field of view wider than the standard camera on an iPhone 17 but not as wide as the ultrawide camera on that phone. This wide scope is fairly unique among cheap film cameras; most feature a more standard 35-mm. focal length or something in that ballpark. The Reto’s lens lets you capture more of the scene and lends your shots a dynamic, expansive feel that is a hallmark of wide-angle photography. It’s great for photographing groups of people, landscapes, and city scenes.
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I’ve owned dozens of film cameras, ranging from multi-thousand-dollar medium-format rigs to small, pocketable point-and-shoots. Yet the Reto wasn’t on my radar despite it being around for years (it is essentially a rebrand of an old Vivitar camera). I was only turned on to it when I saw a smallself-published photo book by Eric Vandrickcomposed of images shot with the Reto Ultra Wide. I loved the loose but evocative style Vandrick was able to capture, so I tried one out for myself.
Appreciating this camera requires an understanding of its limitations. You cannot adjust focus. Its focal range is fixed at one meter to infinity. As long as your subject is more than one meter away, you are guaranteed an in-focus shot. You cannot adjust exposure. The Reto’s f-stop is fixed at f/11, and its shutter speed is fixed at 1/125 of a second. This means you can only use this camera in ample daylight. It will depend on what film you select, but a typical 400 ISO film will let you shoot comfortably from bright sunlight to golden-hour conditions. Most indoor locations will not yield great results, and there’s no flash to help the situation. That might seem overly limiting, but it’s all about the mindset. Think of the Reto as a vacation cam, a scenery and people-gathering cam, an outdoor-activity cam. It’s not a general-purpose shooter.
Once you learn to accept and love the Reto’s constraints, you can let loose and embrace the expressive side of film photography. There are no exposure modes or focus adjusters to worry about, no forgetting to enable a setting or flip a switch. Just shoot freely and enjoy the process. There will be imperfections and mistakes — these are to be welcomed. Due to the Reto’s all-plastic build and general budget-oriented design, imperfections are part of the package. Expect things like corner vignetting, wild lens flare, and the occasional light leak. I am often delighted by the weird visual qualities I end up with after developing a roll shot with the Reto.
The overall appeal of the Reto Ultra Wide and Slim is the incredible ease of use that comes with its simple design in concert with its unique ultrawide lens. It’s perfect for a pocket or handbag whenever you’re outside in the world. The cost is minimal, and you will discover a flavor in your shots that you simply don’t get with most other low-cost film cameras.
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