Half-Frame has officially MADE IT

You know it's popular when Fujifilm jumps in on something...

In a What’s Hot and What’s Not moment, Fujifilm has determined that Half-Frame is indeed still very HOT.

The stats on my H35N YouTube video (published Nov 2023 and STILL kickin) would also tell you the same thing…much to the dismay of a few rather quite “serious” photographers out there who bemoan camera companies targeting “TikTokers” because they cannot fathom not being the only target market for every release from every camera manufacturer.

“Trust me. Half-frame is in. Half-frame is hot. I want some Half-frame. Half-frame it’s gonna be.”

(Words actually said by a totally real vampire from England)

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, lemme catch you up real quick. On the half-frame thing, not the vampire quote (if you don’t know who that is you have some googling to do).

SO, Fujifilm released a “half-frame” digital camera called the X-Half. Mmmmm sexy name (gag).

screenshot from fujifilm x-half website

Check out all the juicy details here (this is where I heard about it first):

This camera looks super fun and I’m happy to see camera companies target young/beginner/casual/social media focused markets. It means innovation and interesting products.

Ok, that being said, while the X-Half might be a fantastic solution or tool for lots of photographers out there, I am still very much on the ANALOGUE photography train bound for grain and glory.

Which brings me to the real reason for this newsletter today…to share some Pentax 17 photos with you but these ones are IN COLOR. As promised. :) I also just wanted to say hi. It’s been awhile. :) I’m good - how are you?

These photos are of winter (glad that’s gone for now) but I’ve been working my way through a couple of rolls VERY SLOWLY this spring so maybe by autumn I’ll have something to show for it. LOL. Expect about 100 photos of kale, cabbage, and broccoli plants, plus tomatoes, peppers, my garden crocs, basil, pickling cucumbers, herbs, squash, beans, my greenhouse, corn, more squash, lettuce, and more herbs…

Side quest - I hyperfixated on the garden thing and now have too many seedlings and not the heart to throw them in the compost yet. So, the garden expands…it’s okay, the chickens will help me out with the extras!

This is a fishing cabin ON ICE. ON THE ICE. On a frozen lake. And there were also trucks, TRUCKS! Driving! ON THE ICE!

Terrifying…

Here is another photo of my rolleiflex and my boots…ON THE ICE. That black patch underneath the snow that I cleared with my boot? ICE. FYI - it’s slippery. :/

This is Fujifilm C200 film.

And here are more people walking, ON THE ICE. Just casually, ya know, as if they’ve been doing this every winter for their whole lives (they have).

Ok, so you know how I was anxious about the people, cabins, and trucks all on the ice? Well, right over yonder to the right of the photo above was an AIRFIELD.

Yeah…PLANES…ON THE ICE.

We didn’t see any this time because they had closed the landing strip to clear snow from a snowstorm that happened the night before. But, if you time it right, you can watch planes land and take off here…ON THE ICE. eek!

So, after that stressful yet exhilarating experience of wondering if the next truck, cabin, or snowmobile was going to collapse into the frozen lake, I found myself on quite solid ground in a familiar setting…the city. Well, ahem, a “city” which isn’t really a city, but it’ll have to do for now.

I LOVE the photos from this roll on the Pentax 17. No regrets so far in buying this camera.

Though, I really really need to work on estimating the close up focus distances better…yikes!

Here I did better, but I think it’s a matter of me being more careful to check the focus settings. The Pentax 17 has the distance markings in feet and meters just below the lens on the front of the camera which is VERY smart and considerate of different measuring systems…though the U.S. should get over themselves and just switch to the metric for the world’s sanity.

This is such an amazing day-to-day camera as long as you are careful about checking the focus distances.

Oh, and also taking the lens cap off when you start taking pictures. That’s important to check too.

BTW - these photos were developed and scanned by CatLabs, my fav at the moment :)

I think the Pentax 17 is the camera of 2025 for me. While I have been shooting the Nikon FM2n (like one roll), it’s a slower camera and I’m finding myself getting increasingly annoyed at squinting through the viewfinder to focus and also to incessently checking the exposure readings.

As for the future of Pentax? With TKO retiring, there seemed to be some concerns about the continuity of the film camera project. Hopefully, with the popularity of the 17 and film, the project continues but we’ll see! Even if it goes no further, I’m super grateful that they were able to produce the Pentax 17 and even more grateful each year that film still exists.

That feels like a good place to end this post, so I’ll say goodbye for now and wish you all a beautiful spring (or winter hemisphere-depending).

Tell me in the comments what you are looking forward to shooting this summer?