The Travelling Toy Camera Project and a Review of the Vivitar Ultra Wide & Slim

The travelling toy camera project is a collaborative effort between various members of the www.toycamera.com forum. The idea is that a camera, in this case a Vivitar Ultra Wide & Slim, is passed around the various members of the group who each keep the camera for a week, shoot a few rolls before sending off to the next person in the chain.

The Vivitar UWS had already travelled through Canada, the US and Spain before arriving in that cradle of British Lomography, Broxbourne, a couple of weeks ago. At the time of writing the Vivitar has just arrived in Sweden and from then on who knows where the camera will end up.

The real star of the show is the Vivita Ultra Wide & Slim. A 35mm point and shoot with a wide 22mm lens, this camera takes the most amazing pictures. The camera is as basic as it gets. A slim plastic body, fixed aperture and shutter speed make this a very portable, easy to use camera.

On the down side the film winding mechanism looks abit fragile (only use 24 exposure films) and the counter is difficult to read, otherwise I can't fault it. The Vivitar UWS has been compared to the Lomo LCA and I have to say I prefer it to the Russian classic. It's more reliable than the Lomo and is smaller and lighter so it fits nicely in a pocket ready to be whipped out in a moment's notice.

The real evidence is in the pictures and the great thing about the Travelling Toy Camera Project is that the camera has been used by a variety of different people from different backgrounds and each one with their one style and perspective. To the camera's lasting credit it has produced great results in each case.

With my love of landscape photography I decided to see how the Vivitar UWS would cope with a few walks around Broxbourne and surrounding area - you can see the results below. I also took the camera out to Hoddesdon to see how it liked a classic example of 1960s British urban planning (ie arrange millions of cheap bricks and concrete into soulless cubes and call it a miracle of modern social engineering).

You can see the landscape photographs I took by clicking on the link and feel free to comment, link etc at your leisure. Also don't forget to check out the Travelling Toy Camera blog - it has some great images.


A National Speed Limit sign near Bayford.

The River Lea at Broxbourne.

Hoddesdon town centre.

The catholic church at Hoddesdon.