When we first held the Spinner 360º in our hands, it had all of the earmarks of a classic product from the world of Lomography.
Simple design, solid construction, and a unique perspective

We had seen panoramic cameras,and had tricked out 35mm film cameras with a special Minolta hard matte for that special pana-look.
But 360º????

Here is what it looks, like. Officially.

You can see that it is held by the long handle, and when you pull the ring, stand back, because the camera head does all of the spinning.
It seemed to spin around and around, but apparently only did a 360º. Plus a bit more.
Check out the edges on the photo above, and you can see the image return to the start on the outside edges.
Not wanting to be in the shot, we crouched down and held it on top of our head.

OK, but then what if you held it on it’s side?
Here is one image shown right side up, and upside down. We think.

You did a full return and the image could be approached from either side, like a playing card.

You get about 7-8 shots on a 35mm roll of 36.
Lomography did the process and scan, through an outside vendor, who knew not to cut the elongated images on the neg.

The costs involved? The camera itself is about $150. USD.
Each roll of film cost about $8, and the process and scan for B&W was about $18 and for color about $24.
It took approximately 4 days to get the images back.

The special properties of the camera and shooting film definitely, sloooowed down the entire thought process.
What would be a best shot for the camera? The exposure was determined by a 2 step slide:
cloudy and sunny.
My eyes had to think a bit more about the exposure.
What was the trajectory of the lens as it spun around and what would it see?
How fast you pulled the ring also was an exposure factor.
We figure it’ll take a good $125-$160 to get a starting handle on some possibles options.
The scans that came back were pretty flat so some beef was added in Photoshop. They’ll have to learn to clean the negs a bit better too.
Just because it’s a Lomo camera, doesn’t mean that sloppy processing is OK. Analog is cool, dirt is not.

You can add an LED light on top to illuminate the night.
You can manually turn the head.

It has specific functions and we did get some cool results from the first roll.
Unique? yes. Must Buy? not really. Unless you’ve been missing that look in your repertoire.
Sure it’s fun, but expensive fun. There are many more cameras in the Lomo line that may better serve your analog eye.

Here is a vid of the camera in action:

Great gift for the photog who has everything, and it will truly challenge your creativity.
Heck, when it first came out some rock and roll shooter had bought one immediately, for a promo shot of a band.
Like we said, a unique way to go.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 12th, 2010 at 9:24 pm and is filed under Photo News, Product Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.