Cheap point and shoot camera for kid going to summer camp

mackigator

mackigator

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Each year I send my kids to summer camp with at least two disposable film cameras each, usually Fuji's. Digital is banned at camp, as are cell phones. The darn disposable things are sometimes $30 apiece and never less than $15. Search Results

I note the cheap prices of 80's point and shoots and many rangefinders on Ebay, I'm thinking of sending them with actual cameras this next year and would appreciate your advice.

My criteria:
  • 35mm
  • The more automatic, the better
  • It must have a built in flash
  • It most cost so little that if lost, I won't care. $50 as upper limit.
  • It can't be huge and scream vintage/retro. My kids must manage the social pressures of middle school, you know. Pocketable is good.
  • It should make better pictures than a disposable. I don't want anything that will miss focus half the time, and yet nothing so manual that my kids have to fuss with too much.
What it does not need:
  • It does not need a zoom lens.
  • It is not required to be all-auto everything. My kids are pre-teens and already know the basics of handling a camera, so they could handle aperture or shutter priority if it came right down to it. But I want to avoid making them think about too much more than "I want to see what that looks like as a picture" when they think about using the camera.
  • It does not need to be waterproof, but a little bit rugged is a good thing.
  • It does not have to be an actual rangefinder, in terms of operation. It could be, but not required.
I own, and love, and shoot, several Olympus XA's. I've got a few Olympus Stylus cameras and some others - these are all too expensive to send them with. But if there was a camera with similar features, from some brand/model that has not been discovered by Instagrammers, that cost very little, that would be great!

Any suggestions?
 
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Dear mackigator,

I'd suggest you look to eBay or Shopgoodwill for 35mm P&S auctions. You should be able to find lots of cameras in the sub $ 50.00 range. I've bought many for $ 10.00 or so plus shipping and the majority of them work fine with new batteries and a little cleaning. I've gotten Pentax and Olympus clamshell design cameras that would be great for kids to take to camp. Fuji Discovery cameras and the various Olympus IS series are others to look at.

As you shop have Camera Wikipedia or google open and research the potential purchase. Some of those late 80's and early 90's cameras were actually pretty decent performers.

Good luck!

Tim Murphy

Harrisburg PA :)
 
Quote: Digital is banned at camp :Quote.

I'm not sure if you want your children to be exposed to half-ignorants.
Another half - no mobiles is OK.

Film is really a luxury for these days. Demanding it is a bit dorkish.
See, you are afraid to give them something as primitive as XA.

And they are not going to learn anything from taking less pictures.
It is giftless losers concept.
 
If the camp's concern is sharing of pictures and kids' noses in the screens, I get it. I'm on the advisory board of the summer sleepaway camp I went to as a kid, and the intent to get the kids to "unplug" is very worthwhile -- no cell phones allowed there (no idea about cameras, though I expect they're no allowed either). But the Camp Snap digital ($65; not unreasonable at all) seems like just the thing -- you can't see the pictures until you upload the images from the memory card. In other words, the pictures won't be seen until they get home, just like with a film camera. But it's probably way too time consuming to explain this to the camp's decisionmakers.
 
Nick is right. Camp Snap digital toy cameras. They are simple to operate. One button. No screen, so the photos cannot be shared by other kids unless they have a way to load the photos onto a device. Built-in memory card and battery. Cheap. I paid 65.00 for mine, too, and it is a blast to use. They come in different colors. I let one of my grandchildren use it the other day and the kids loved it. Image quality is surprisingly good. And like I said, it is the easiest camera in the world to operate. One button and that is it. But, if they are adamant about no digital cameras of any kind, then this will not work.
 
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You might want to look for a Canon AF-8 "Sure Shot Owl" (that's what it's called in the US; I think it goes by "Pixma" in other markets). I bought one from Goodwill Auctions back in the good old days of nearly free film cameras. I paid $5 plus shipping. It's an extremely simple point and shoot with a huge viewfinder. It only autofocuses on the center point, so you would have to teach your kids to focus and recompose, but other than that it's dead simple. It's got a control wheel on the front that gives you auto, auto with fill flash, auto no-flash, and selftimer modes. No other controls besides the shutter button. I've put about 5–6 rolls through mine and it has operated flawlessly. The lens is a triplet but sharp enough for the purpose. And it conveniently runs on AA batteries.
 
The requirements are silly as far as I am concerned but that's a different ballgame.

Look for an Olympus Mju II. The GOAT of it's type.
 
I see them around here for about $50 as NOS in second hand shops so that's not a big deal to me. There are other Oly clamshells even cheaper but they may have gotten "status" since I last looked for one.
 
This thread makes me miss my Minolta Weathermatic. Guess it may be a bit bulky for this purpose, but it's rugged, waterproof, has two lens settings, built-in flash, auto-wind/rewind, AF, auto exposure. Think there was something similar that wasn't as big or yellow.
 
joe bosak said:
This thread makes me miss my Minolta Weathermatic. Guess it may be a bit bulky for this purpose, but it's rugged, waterproof, has two lens settings, built-in flash, auto-wind/rewind, AF, auto exposure. Think there was something similar that wasn't as big or yellow.
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Dear Joe,

I had a Minolta Weather Matić and gave it away when I kind of gave up photography. When a complete kit with case and viewfinder showed up in a Goodwill Auction I bought another for a few $'s.

My brother and I did a lot of float tube fishing back when I owned the first one. We used to throw it back and forth to each other in the lake so we could get pictures of fish. I never acted up no matter how it was treated.

The other camera you may be thinking of is the Canon Aqua Snappy. It came in several versions.

Regards,

Tim Murphy

Harrisburg PA :)
 
The ones that I have used and recommend are the Espio line from Pentax. The 70WR is water resistant and the 115G is small with nice lens.

Also have a look at the Riva line by Minolta. I had the Riva 70 and had nice lens and the 140EX which is chunky camera but almost rivals zoom SLRs of that period (Practical Photography magazine compared it to the 3xi).

Olympus MJU zoom are nice also. I had the superzoom 140s and I was impressed with the lens and the AF. It is quite chunky though.

If you don't want zoom lens, canon flooded the markets in the 90s with cheap p&s cameras like the Prima Twin S or some cheaper ones like the Sure Shot M. Zoomwise, the canon sure shot 120 is very nice but I think it got expensive recently.

Nikon also has some good p&s compacts - the One Touch Zoom was nice. Also the LiteTouch zoom series is excellent but recently it got expensive.

One final recommendation are the Fuji compacts, I had the Zoomdate 100 which was a great camera when it was sunny. The lens starts from f5.6 at 28mm and goes to f/11 by 100mm.
 
I know it's not going to fly, because it's a giant indestructible brick, but a Nikonos IV-A or V would be perfect for a camp situation, especially if there is canoeing or swimming. If I could talk to my 25 year old self, I'd demand that I take two Nikonos cameras to Iraq when I deploy. Even kids can't easily destroy them (aside from flooding...)
Phil
 
santino said:
Just out of curiosity: why are digital cameras banned at camp?
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I think they are banned for more than one reason, all related. I like the ban, as I do the ban on phones.

Summer Camp is a place for being disconnected from regular life in order to focus on your time in camp, new friends, and camp activities. Many U.S. summer camps ban cell phones, digital devices, and other items a kid might bring from home that would distract from that focus.

As for digital cameras, my guess is they are difficult to police in that some contain wifi, games, and other weird features; they separate the child from whatever they are participating in, in a way that snapping a few film images might not; and they might produce images of kids that should not circulate online or might not have correct participant permissions.
 
ChrisPlatt said:
Unless you find something you can test and confirm operating properly for a few dollars at a charity shop IMO you are probably better off staying with the disposables.

Chris
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That's the whole challenge, really. Can I find something that was close enough in price to disposable that I could send my kids with some film rolls instead.
 
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