Gosh, this felt like a heavy camera. This great blog says the camera is from 1990 and has a very heavy plasticky feel. I agree. That blog has all the technical details you could ever need including descriptions of all the different modes, and there are a lot of modes. Have a look at the selection dial.

There is even a mode for panning, I haven’t seen that before. When I put the film into the camera it wound all of it into the place that usually takes up the film. That meant every time you took a shot, the camera wound it back into the canister. I like that, it means if you accidentally open the back, most of the shots taken are safe.

With so many modes it was difficult to remember them all. This is one of those cameras you have to use a lot to get fully familiar with it and to know when to change modes. I tended to stick to the “P” mode which is the intelligent program mode. Due to the area, I was testing the camera in I did use the landscape mode sometimes.

One feature I really loved was the switch on the side to turn the automatic flash on and off. It was easy to see and simple to use, no pressing buttons and rotating through modes.  In auto mode, the flash pops up when needed and automatically retracts after. Really the only thing I didn’t like about this camera was the weight. Even with the shorter, light lens, it felt really heavy.

I took the camera on a scoot up a mountain. Here are my test shots.

It was a really bright day, the Fujifilm handled it very well. Plus the camera’s intelligent program also coped very well. It chose to use the flash a few times and the resulting flash did not overpower the image. In fact, you might find it hard to tell which shots used the flash. The image of Ebisu and the image of the lion’s butt both used the flash. I think it is a great camera, but get a very comfortable strap if you want to carry it around.

Keep or Sell: The camera can be found quite cheaply on eBay. The weight would make it expensive to post anywhere for a reasonable price. I will have to ponder it…I gave it to a friend.