5 frames with an Olympus Trip MD2 and Kentmere 400

While my camera of choice has been an Olympus OM1 for a while now, I am always on the lookout for something cheap and cheerful to stick in my rucksack or pocket for days where a bigger or more valuable camera might not be a good idea. Earlier this year I ended up with half a dozen very cheap point & shoot models which were passed around to the guests at my daughter’s wedding, and I really should have stopped at that point. But when I saw a small selection of cameras in a charity shop window, well, I had to go in didn’t I?

I homed in on an Olympus Trip MD2, about which I knew nothing at all, but hey, it’s an Olympus, so it must be alright. It still had some batteries in it, the shutter made the right sort of sound, and then there was a loud winding-on noise. So MD stands for motor drive. The front had a small selector for choosing the film speed, from 100 to 1000, and that was it. For aperture and shutter speed, trust the camera. I pointed it at a dark corner and the flash worked too. The price tag said £10, and the cause was a worthy one, so I walked out with another candidate for the position of Take It Anywhere Camera.

Back home, I started to do a bit of research into my purchase, and found surprisingly little online. The front of the camera says the lens is 35mm, f/4.5, but that’s as much as I know. As you alter the film speed you can see the aperture change, and the shutter speed is fixed at 1/125. The focus is fixed too, so I assumed it was the usual five feet minimum. There is a little slide switch under the front, which has a picture of a mountain next to it. As you move it, you can see the lens change position, so that’s for very long distance shots. And that’s as complicated as it gets. But does it work?

A roll of Kentmere 400 went into it, nothing too expensive, in case it was a disaster, and I took it with me on a couple of trips, to Castle Howard and Whitby, both bright-ish days. The results were better than I expected.

Things are pretty sharp, whatever the distance, and the exposure is pretty good too. A couple of shots were too shady, but I realised later that with 400ASA film in, I could have changed the film speed setting to 200 or even 100 to open things up a bit. Of course, the batteries ran out of juice half way through, so that’s something to keep in mind if it is going on a long trip. But apart from that, I think it was £10 well spent.

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