If you’re new to film photography, the best way to get oriented is to start with something easy and cheap. Disposable 35-mm. cameras have typically filled this need, but many who try them find the resulting images too plain or unusable. Shots are often out of focus, underexposed, or simply lacking in the character they expected from the film experience. I recently came upon a camera that takes the low-stakes ease of a disposable and adds just enough character to make shooting actually fun and your pictures come alive.
The Reto Ultra Wide and Slim is a plastic 35-mm. camera that costs $30, is very small, and weighs almost nothing. There are no controls to speak of aside from the shutter button and a winding mechanism — it’s the very definition of basic. What makes it fun is the lens, which is, as the name implies, very wide. With a 22-mm. focal length, it captures a field of view wider than the standard camera on an iPhone 17 but not as wide as the ultrawide camera on that phone. This wide scope is fairly unique among cheap film cameras; most feature a more standard 35-mm. focal length or something in that ballpark. The Reto’s lens lets you capture more of the scene and lends your shots a dynamic, expansive feel that is a hallmark of wide-angle photography. It’s great for photographing groups of people, landscapes, and city scenes.
