The Holga owes its incredible images to a few factors: a fresh and simple semi-wide plastic lens, professional-grade medium format film, a long exposure option, the ability to shoot multiple times on the same frame and advance partial frames, a somewhat-not-light-tight body, and exactly 12.4 pounds of bonafide magical pixie dust.
Plastic 60/8 Optical Lens
The Holga's heart and soul. A dead-simple multi-element plastic lens that makes colors radiate and makes total image sharpness take a brief holiday. You can also expect a bit of vignetting (darkening) around the edges – especially on a sunny day. The focal length is approximately equal to 38mm on a standard 35mm camera – so it's a little bit wider than the normal perspective.
120 Medium Format Film
From glossy fashion magazine covers, to dead-serious landscape shots, to the "Electric Slide" dance at Uncle Bob's wedding, the camera of choice if very likely to be medium format. Created by the Kodak company in 1898, medium format film has filled the guts of professional cameras for well over 100 years. At four times the size of 35mm film, it offers amazing resolution and deep, fantastic colors. A typical 120 print has an incredible richness and depth that no 35mm image can touch.
Uncoupled Advance and Shutter
After you shoot a Holga image, you can choose to advance it one full frame, a partial frame, or not advance at all. 120 film shows its exposure count on the back, and you can read it through a little red window on the Holga's rear door. This feature allows you to shoot limitless times on the same frame (multiple exposures) and advance only partial frames to create a semi-panoramic overlapping image. Hooray!
Variable Shutter Speeds
You lucky duck. You get two to choose from. The standard daytime speed of 1/125 second or the exotic long-exposure "B" setting – where you can hold the shutter open for as long as you want. Use "B" to capture dazzling night images without a flash. Pair the "B" setting with a flash shot to freeze your sharp, flashed subject in front of a streaming, glowing background. Team the "B" setting with a tripod (via the bottom tripod thread) for a sharp night portrait.
Variable Aperture
A little weather guide helps you out. Choose f/11 for sunny shots and f/8 for cloudy and nighttime shots. Pretty easy, that one.
Zone Focus
Fun, fabulous, and very fast. The lens has four focus settings – portrait, small group, big group, and infinity. Guess as best you can and fire away.
Flash System
This is the standard flash, nothing colourfull
Film Masks
This version is supplied with the 6x6 and 6x4.5 film masks, giving you approx 12 or 16 images on a roll of 120, well depending on how you wind on the camera!
