The Family: MICKEY (Lomography Lomo MC-A)

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 Introducing: Mickey

hello! i figured, in the interest to getting to know each other, you and i should become better acquainted. to that end, i thought i'd make a series of posts showcasing all of my cameras. yes, i do give all my stuff human names. what's life without whimsy?

a photo of a black compact camera with silver detailing.

oh wow it's a premium lomography camera? a lomography branded camera with a metal body and multicoated glass lens? a lomography point and shoot camera that can also be operated fully manually? an electric beast with autofocus, light meter, different flash modes, and all the quirks and foibles you'd expect from a lomography camera? and what's that? it costs £450? 

what is going on here. a camera so magic that more than a few lomography purists consider it too good to be a lomography project. let's have a looksee, shall we? 


a flash photo of a pair of pride flags mounted behind the tv.
a photo of a garden, with a lawn on the left, and washing hanging up on the right.
a photo of a kallax shelving unit holding most of my cameras.
a flash photo taken of a blue and black desk fan.

i've wanted this camera ever since it started making the rounds on youtube. i love lomography, as you know, and this looked like the perfect camera. fully auto and electric (except the lovely mechanical wind on lever), you can use its autofocus and auto exposure settings to get quick and dirty shots without thinking. or, if you fancy, you can take control with zone focusing (great for taking mirror selfies or shooting through glass), full auto (where you choose the aperture and shutter speed) or aperture priority (where you choose the aperture and the camera picks the right shutter speed for the shot). it has an exposure compensation dial on top and everything.

it's also got everything you'd expect from a lomography camera. bulb mode (up to 20 seconds) for long exposures. coloured gels for making your flashes more than stark white. and, of course, a multiple exposure button. take a shot, and instead of winding it on, hit that button and take another shot. and another. as many as you want.

a double exposure. i'm holding my hand to the sun, and in the silhouette you can see the blooms of flowers and leaves. the photo has a yellow/green tint to it, very trippy.
a double exposure; one shot is of a tall building. the other is flowers in a basket. it looks like the building is clad with a giant photo of flowers.
a shot of a bridge and the buildings on the other side of the river, double exposed with the light dappled surface of the water itself. 

this camera is new. as a result, i've only put a few rolls through it, but my one main takeaway is that it is FUN to use. imagine that! i've shot it on full auto and i've found the autofocus to be accurate, though it does tend to default to an aperture of 2.8 a lot of the time, so i mostly shoot in AP. being able to control the aperture on a point and shoot is fantastic, and the images i'm getting back tell me this is a camera that's not here to mess around.

loading the camera took a bit of learning; assuming it was the same as my SLR was not the way to go, and i wasted a roll by doing it this way - the spool didn't take it, leaving the film just rattling around loose in there. after getting in touch with lomography and receiving a video back, i know what i'm doing now. still, mourning that lost film in a world where the cheapest roll of colour costs around £10. expensive mistake to make.

a photo of an alcove with exposed brick and multiple large waste disposal bins set to the wall. a man leaves the building on the left hand side. the photo is warm toned. there's water flowing from the gutters into the space itself. the word "columba" is on the back wall.
a close up photo of a brutalist staircase, with a "mind your head" sign in bright yellow with warning icons.
a photo of a brick wall, heavily vignetted, with a section of bricks in the centre newer than the rest of the wall, as if someone has smashed through it and repairs have been made.
a view of a tall brutalist building against a cloudy blue sky, from the street below.

much like guppy, this camera came with a splitzer, for creative multiple exposures. i've not tried that out yet but i've had a lot of fun with the one that came with guppy, so i intend to at least try it once. also in the box came a lens cap and a uv filter. obviously the danger with a lens cap is that it's a point and shoot and it lets you fire the shutter with the cap still on, so remembering to take it off is something i would definitely do at all times and have never once forgotten. ahem.

also: if you've seen the reviews on youtube for this camera, nine times out of ten you're gonna find that frame spacing is an issue. either the camera doesn't wind the frame on properly or you have to compensate by cranking the wind on lever another half stop after you've wound it on. i get my shots developed at a local lab, and if there are these issues, i've never seen them on my scans; they've all come back perfectly. 


Pros:

  • look at it. it's gorgeous. proper good looking piece of machinery, this
  • fully auto or fully manual or anything in between
  • great lens, feels like it's well made
  • packed with features for creativity! multiple exposures and coloured flash gels and bulb mode, oh my!
  • for once, i'm going to list zone focusing as a pro. really helpful when the auto focuses on the window and not what's behind it. 

Cons:

  • loading film is a learning curve, and even knowing how to do it, it's more difficult than it really needs to be
  • the viewfinder doesn't provide a lot of information, just a couple of LEDs you've got to discern the meanings of. 
  • price is a little eye-watering. if it wasn't for a very specific circumstance i'd never have been able to afford this camera.
  • rewind lever feels a liiiiittle crunchy, not smooth at all.

Check out the rest of the family here!

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