Akira SLR Toy Camera: Big Yet Simple

Mostly given as either a promotional item or just for fun, this handy toy camera a-la single lens reflex was given by a friend way back during the ’90s. What was left forgotten for quite some time has now come to reassure its own destiny.

My friend gave me a camera some years ago. I wasn’t able to appreciate those kind of things since digital age was up-and-coming and everybody was talking in megapixels and megabytes. So I hid this plastic camera somewhere around the house and totally dismissed it.

Some few years after, I was busy digging up some scraps at the back of my house when I found the camera again. It was still in its box and when I opened it, it’s covered with a faux leather case. I opened the case and found a big, bulky and was thinking of a Holga during that time. I was even surprised! I was claiming that I have an SLR in my hand. Well, it was a mistake.

Akira toy camera is actually a pseudo-SLR camera that is made entirely of plastic even up to the lens. The only good and palpable thing about this toy camera is that it has f-stops from f/6.3 to f/16. There are two viewfinders. One is at the right part when facing the camera, while the other is a-la twin lens reflex style, in which you hold the camera and have a little “looking down” on it. I don’t have any idea if that thing works with or without parallax error but this simple camera is a nice run-through over your collections. Some claimed this to be a replica of the Diana or Holga. It even has a lens cap with an inscription “camera”. A hot-shoe is included in this big monster while it feeds on two (2) AA batteries so it can auto-wind and rewind the 35mm film before and after use.

After taking some shots, I noticed a slight dark area or vignette in both left and right sides of the picture. I don’t know where this is coming from (might be from the f-stops) but it looks cool. Since it dares a focus-free, I don’t have any idea how to estimate the focusing distance thus some shots turned out to be blurry.

written by ethermoon on 2009-03-30 #gear #35mm #review #ethermoon #akira-toy-camera