Lomography Sprocket Rocket

I love the simplicity and sheer fun of Lomography A.G.'s plastic cameras, and the Sprocket Rocket delivers! I love shooting with this thing. My only gripe is that it should probably come packaged with a Digitaliza film holder; scanning the full width of 35mm film with my existing epson film holders is a little tricky (ok, actually, a LOT tricky). Because it's so light, I'm finding that it's always in my camera bag, and always loaded and ready. Because it's so fun and simple, I find that I'm taking just as many risks as I would with a Diana or Holga (or LC-A)... but with the SprocketRocket I'm burning through film just a tad faster. Oh well, that's what short ends are for...

Saw this online and liked the esthetics. When on hand it felt lighter than expected. Will use later and update thenñ review, was looking for a nice quality landscape camera and this one just popped up.

I have software on my phone that will simulate Lomo shots and I like this very much so I descided to try the real thing. I picked this particular camera because I like the sprockets being exposed and scanned / developed in the shots. Upon reciept I was surprised at how plastic, and primative, the camera was especially in relation to the price. As far as plastic is concerned it's even cheap for that. However I do appreciate the primativeness of the device. I took some shots and promptly took them to a one hour photo to get the film developed, scanned and maybe some printed. They know how to develop the film, however they did not have the capabilities to scan the sprockets or print doublewides. Well,... that's the whole thing, right? I found this to be common with "1 Hour" shops so I called some beautiq photo shops around town. They all said they could take this task on for a large premium. :( So the next option was to scann them myself and then go from there. A typicall flatbed scanner, which I have, won't work, so you have to purchase a specialized one. The off the shelf film scanners will not provide the desired results as well. So the choices I was left with were; 1 - buy a new scanner and accessory from the camera manufacturer to get the scans to work or send the film to a beautique shop. Too much of a financial and time investment for me. What have I learned from this? Bridging the digital and analog world is #$#@# sometimes.... Unless you really want to dive into this I would recommend getting a camera where the film can be easily processed. I sent this back to Amazon. Not because of the camera itself but because of the work after.

I keep finding excuses to load film into this camera. It's a little tricky and results can be unexpected, particularly if you forget to forward the film or remove the lens cap. The lens actually gets in the way of the viewfinder, so that adds to the element of surprise as well when you develop your images. It's remarkably sharp in the center, too. Just a ton of fun to use and adds to your creative options.

Processing the film is expensive!

The back cover is a little sketchy to work with.

Basic, straight-forward, fun camera that allows for a lot of exploration and creativity! Panoramic, edge-to-edge images are unique. Easy to do multiple exposures. Basic but solid understanding of photography will help you get the most out of this camera.

Unfortunately, I did not have good experiences with this camera. All of my films were very disappointing. The camera also broke very quickly (the film turner stopped working, so now I can't turn the film, which means I can't shoot).