Olympus XA2 - The Grab and Go Camera!

5

A powerful yet pocketable film camera for everyday use often compared to an LC-A. This camera is so small and convenient that you can carry it around almost anywhere yet produces fantastic results.

I am a professional photographer who normally shoots digital, but I just love how easy and liberating it is to use this camera. Just set your focus using its three-step zone focusing system, and point and shoot, leaving you to concentrate more on the content of your image on than your camera settings!

The camera itself is tiny (by film camera standards) and made of hard plastic and metal in just the right places. It fits in most pant pockets but just barely. A jacket pocket or a small side bag makes the best home for the XA2. Operation of the camera is simple:

1) Load film
2) Set ISO for film between ISO 25 to 800 (TIP: to make do EV compensation to make brighter images use a lower ISO than the film you have loaded! To darken your images just use a higher ISO)
3)Slide open the lens cover
4) Choose focusing zone (close up, normal, or far)
5) Click shutter

The camera has a 35mm F3.5 lens and has auto exposure that usually does a terrific job on metering. With its zone focus, auto metering, and small size it is very comparable to the highly coveted LC-A camera! The XA2 even has a good deal of vignetting! What I really like with it compared to my other rangefinder film cameras is that with decent light I can just slide open the lens cover and the camera resets to the normal focusing distance so I am ready to take the picture without having to worry about any other camera settings. It definitely helps in making sure you don’t miss a shot.

Right now, it’s my favorite camera to use for fun personal stuff and I have several film cameras (Ricoh 500G, Olympus XA, Voightlander R4M). I highly recommend picking one up for anyone who just wants an awesome fun small camera that is great for Lomography but is also a great regular use camera as well! I hope to update this review soon to compare it to an LC-A+ which I will be picking up shortly as well.

written by sf20423303 on 2011-07-09 #gear #review #xa2 #olympus #lomography #film-camera #user-review #zone-focusing

5 Comments

  1. hughh
    hughh ·

    Nice review and great shots! I love the XA cameras, I was lucky enough to get my hands on an XA a while ago which I'm really happy with. Only problem I can think of is the lack of a hotshoe but it's so compact there probably wouldn't be room for one!

  2. sidsel
    sidsel ·

    Good job with both the pictures and the review! I've recently found my grandad's XA but haven't finished the first roll yet - it's a ISO 100 and here it's raining all the time!

  3. eva_eva
    eva_eva ·

    Great gallery! :)

  4. megalithicmatt
    megalithicmatt ·

    hughh - the XA series cameras have dedicated screw-on flash units of variable power.

  5. remychaloner
    remychaloner ·

    got a xa2 from a charity shop, box and flash and even the original receipt, it cost me £3 !! used it so far a beautiful camera, and a good (and cheap) alternative to a LC-A it will never replace it but is a good camera to give a go. so far only used black and white but putting some xpro slide into it soon...lomo love x

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