The New Half-Frame 35mm Camera from Pentax! - Pentax 17 Review

Foreword

Hey! I’m Connor, the manager of Kamerastore’s product team. This will be a review of my time with the new Pentax 17. This subjective review represents my opinions and viewpoints and doesn’t necessarily reflect the opinions of everyone at Kamerastore. For a more objective overview of the specifications of this new camera, click here. You can also watch the video below for the same information as below in video form. Otherwise, keep reading to learn more about my experience with the new Pentax film camera!

Background

It’s a big deal whenever a new film camera comes out. Whether it’s Lomography, Polaroid, Fujifilm, MiNT, or Leica, we always get excited here at Kamerastore that there’s enough money in our industry to justify research & development for a new camera. It’s not a cheap process, often costing millions of Euros just to get the factory up and running. Making something people like is another thing entirely.

To that end, most of the new film cameras have been pretty niche products. Leica’s M6 revival is targeted squarely at the upper echelon of buyers and collectors, Lomography’s entries are mainly for quirky, creative, lo-fi fun, and Fujifilm/Polaroid stick to the instant space.

Enter Pentax. They were one of the premier manufacturers of film cameras, particularly SLRs, during the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Cameras like the Spotmatic, K1000, ME Super, LX, and *Ist are some of the most iconic 35mm SLRs of all time. The K1000 especially has stood the test of time and is arguably one of the top 5 most famous film cameras out there.

It would have been easy for Pentax, now owned by Ricoh, to stick to their niche. They’ve committed to the DSLR in an era where other companies are switching to mirrorless and are offering unique cameras with niche features. They offer the only full monochrome digital SLR on the market and have class-leading weather-sealing. Instead, though, Pentax unveiled plans for a series of new film cameras. These cameras would come out over several years and would be aimed at the growing market of hobbyist film photographers, particularly young people. Pentax wanted to reinvigorate their brand by reconnecting with their film roots.

What is it? Who Is It For?

Now, after what felt like a long wait, we have the first camera from this roadmap—the Pentax 17. It’s a half-frame, zone-focus camera with programmed auto-exposure aimed very squarely at young hobbyists looking to move away from disposable cameras or the likes of Kodak’s H35.

I think the H35 is a great point of comparison for the 17. Both are newly produced half-frame film cameras from well-known brands. Both are clear responses to the growth in the film industry but also responses to the common complaint that film is too expensive. In this sense, a half-frame makes sense. Each shot is half the cost when you get twice the shots.

There are some key differences, though. The Pentax aims to deliver a lot more creative control than the Kodak, with programmed auto exposure, manual focus control, and exposure compensation compared to the Kodak’s single shutter speed. The Pentax also has a glass triplet lens compared to the Kodak, which only added one glass element in their new H35N iteration.

The Pentax costs over 5 times what the Kodak does, though, so I don’t think they’re in direct competition. I think it’s more reasonable to suggest that Pentax wants the 17 to be the next step for H35 users, or disposable users, or people who inherited a cheap point-and-shoot from family and found it lacking in quality or features. At 579 Euros and with abundant secondhand cameras available, the 17 likely isn’t intended to be the first film camera someone ever uses. But it could easily be the second or third and give years of enjoyment to whoever uses it.

Don’t Judge a Book by Its (Plastic) Cover

When I found out we would get a Pentax 17 before release for review, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it. Pentax did a pretty good job of keeping the camera a secret before release, meaning I had no exact expectations for what it would be. And yet, I was still very surprised when my boss handed it to me.

Honestly, my first thought was that it was.. interesting looking. It has since grown on me quite a lot, but it’s hard to argue that the Pentax 17’s design isn’t busy. There are a bunch of different dials on top, a slightly bulging viewfinder, a very flat lens, and many different textures to the plastic body. Even the front and back of the camera have different textures, which is sort of weird.

And by plastic, I really mean plastic. I didn’t think it would be solid steel, but some of the panels on this camera feel quite thin and make the classic “tap-tap” noise when you bump your fingers into them. The top and bottom plates are treated with some metal-feeling coatings (sort of like the Canon AE-1) but the underlying plastic is quite thin and so the illusion isn’t particularly convincing.

I’ll tell you right away that my experience with the camera changed my opinion a lot. There’s a lot of plastic, yes, but the parts that you’re touching consistently are well-built and feel good. The film advance lever and on/off switches are particularly satisfying to play with. The frame underneath is also quite solid, there’s no flex or creaking when handling the camera. A lot of other modern more toy-like cameras, even ones from big manufacturers, feel like they’ll snap in half if you bend them a bit. There’s none of that from the Pentax, which is good.

Aside from the plastics, the thing that struck me the most about the Pentax 17 was the viewfinder. It sticks out a bit from the rest of the body and is a different color, making it hard to ignore. To me, it looks a bit like one of Voigtländer’s M-mount cameras with an external viewfinder. There’s also a prototype of the Leica CL with the same kind of recessed-external-finder look to it. It’s a bit unusual looking, even after having the camera for a week or two.

But you can see it’s a little weird-looking. There are photos right there. What you want to know is what is it like to use and how are the photos! Okay, okay, let’s get to it.

In Use

I had the Pentax 17 for just about a week and shot around three rolls of film with it. That’s around 215 photos, give or take a few. During that time I carried the camera with me everywhere I went. I found it to be a great companion, albeit not without quirks.

My first few shots were taken around our office, just finishing the roll I had inherited from another employee who borrowed the camera before me. I didn’t read the manual at all, just grabbed the camera and tried to figure it out. I played around with the different focus settings and the mode dial. It all made enough sense when sticking to the program modes. I found the minimum focus of 0.25m to be very close, but after reading the manual I discovered that the wrist strap is designed to reach out to 0.25m from the camera when attached. Wish I had known that while I was shooting, but that’s my fault for not reading the manual beforehand.

Speaking of the flash on/off switch, though, the mode dial is confusing. You have your “Auto” mode in blue, then two colored sections above and below it. The yellow section turns the flash on and the white section leaves it off.

I felt a bit overwhelmed when I first saw this because it was different than almost any camera I’d seen. Most modern cameras have the classic PSAM modes and then various creative modes and most film cameras have a shutter speed dial with ISO control built in. There aren’t many fully automatic point-and-shoot cameras with physical mode dials, so it’s interesting to see how Pentax implemented it.

Even if it was confusing at first, it didn’t take long for me to get the hang of the different modes and settings available to me.

RTFM

After finishing that first roll, I gave the manual a look. That’s when I learned what all the modes did. What really puzzled me was the Auto mode. This was the only mode in which the camera could decide whether or not to use the flash, but it also locked the focus to what Pentax calls “pan-focus” distance. Here at Kamerastore, we call this “fixed focus”.

When I told the employee who used the camera before me about it, he was annoyed. He had taken many shots on the auto mode and had taken the time to judge the distance and set focus appropriately. He didn’t read the manual either, it’s not just me I promise.

At first, this choice baffled me. I really liked having control of the focus. It seemed like an important part of the camera, and one of the main things Pentax talked about in their marketing. But I realized this “auto” mode is probably exactly what someone needs if they’re coming from disposable cameras or the Kodak H35. Those cameras don’t offer focus control and are for quick snapshots, often with flash, of groups of people.

With this in mind, the auto mode is probably fine to be fixed focus. It’s sort of like a “party” mode or a mode for people who aren’t comfortable changing too many settings yet.

Touching Grass

For my next few rolls, I did what I try to do as often as possible after work; take a walk. It’s good for your legs and good for your heart, plus it helps you make some art. Hey, that rhymes.

I loaded up some of our own Santacolor 100 to see how the camera handled this film. It can be a bit finicky, but it’d be a good test of the camera’s meter and I’m pretty sure no one else who got the camera early would’ve thought to do it. You’re witnessing world history right here.

I walked around the city and I walked to my favorite local natural area, the Kauppi forest. There are some really nice rocky areas with trees that grow at fun angles and there’s always great light around sunset in the summer.

One thing I tried was to get some dark shadows and deep contrast. The bright sun cutting through the trees gives that effect in spades, and I tried to play with the exposure compensation to see what effect it had. Because I’m a professional tester, I even took the same shot at 0, -1, and -2 EV to see what would happen! Here’s one of some clouds.

Well.. they’re not much different. Of course, there are small corrections that are normally made in the scanning process that are meant to eliminate small exposure errors like this, so that’s likely where this is coming from. What’s most impressive to me is that the Pentax was able to handle this scene at all. It’s not an easy thing to meter for.

If I can say one thing about the Pentax it’s that it didn’t get in my way. Something about half-frame makes me less worried about messing up a shot, so I was shooting away happily as I walked. The Pentax was never too slow or cumbersome to keep up, even if it’s electronically controlled.

Even the focus is electronic even though it’s zone focus, which is interesting. Even though we have a physical ring for focus, it’s a focus-by-wire system. The lens only zooms to the right distance when the shutter button is half-pressed. Assumedly, this was done to lower costs or reuse motors from existing Pentax cameras like their WG series of digital point-and-shoots.

Regardless, the Pentax 17 is fast and quiet in operation. I was struck by just how quiet the whole thing is. The film advance is short and well-dampened, the shutter is a satisfyingly petite click, and the focus motor is as close to silent as it could be. I think the Pentax has all the makings of a candid street photography king, although I’m no expert on that. My mom taught me not to talk to strangers.

Except for this good boy. I would talk to him.

Analog Social Media

An important thing of note is that the Pentax 17 takes vertical photos by default. This is the nature of most half-frame film cameras. This is unlike modern small-sensor digital cameras, like the Micro Four Thirds cameras made by Olympus or Panasonic, which tend to keep their sensors in landscape orientation to more closely mimic the experience of full-frame DSLRs which themselves mimic 35mm film. Confused yet? Stick with me, because I think there’s another reason Pentax made this camera half-frame.

Aside from improving the film economy for beginners, social media had to be on Pentax’s mind when designing the 17. Most film photography content is consumed on smartphones that lend themselves to vertical content. No, the irony is not lost on me, but I’d be lying if I said my default instinct wasn’t to take vertical photos these days.

It’s no secret that vertical content does better on apps like Instagram or TikTok. If I’m Pentax and I’m looking to appeal to a new generation of photographers, making it easy to take vertical photos would be a priority. Another win for half-frame. Maybe the next Pentax camera will be a vertical format 120 camera like Fuji’s old GS645.. I can dream, at least.

More Results (Macro)

Anyway, back to my walk. One thing I was excited to try was the close-focus mode of the Pentax 17. With a minimum focus distance of 0.25m, it should be able to get pretty close to the subject. I’m a known macro/flower enthusiast, so this piqued my interest. Luckily for me, many of the city’s parks had recently been filled with flowers to celebrate the warm weather coming back to Finland.

Overall, I was impressed both with the sharpness of the lens and my own ability to gauge distance and framing properly. At the closest focus distance, you lost probably 50% of the frame to parallax so it’s a bit of guesswork as to what will actually be in frame.

I played around with the different modes again here. The new feature to talk about is the “bokeh” mode. The camera will try to use the widest aperture possible so you’re more likely to get blurry out of focus areas. This will be most effective at close focus distances.

Nice! I love flowers. Even if it’s not the best focal length for macro photos, the 35mm equivalent lens here gives decent performance. Another thing to note is that I could’ve helped myself immensely by using the included wrist strap instead of the one we had lying around. The strap is specifically designed to help you find objects at the minimum focus distance of 0.25m. Pretty nice!

The image quality was a pleasant surprise for me. In the right situation and with good film the camera gives results that are, in my opinion, practically indistinguishable from full-frame cameras. And you get twice the shots! So that’s a win.

I think this photo of a local church is maybe the best example of the sharpness this lens is capable of. Of course, this is a bright scene so it could use a narrow aperture. But the definition of the church’s steeple against the blue sky is very crisp. This photo was taken with Santacolor 100 and has some “halation” around the edges of the leaves and streetlight.

So What?

The Pentax 17 is on sale now for 579 Euros here in Finland. That includes Value-Added Tax (VAT), so prices may vary a bit depending on where you are. It’s a lot to pay if you’re used to bargain-hunting for point-and-shoots, but realistically there are a lot of people who this camera would serve very well. It offers great image quality and excellent film economy in a package with interesting features.

I can see it being a great camera for people upgrading from a cheap point-and-shoot, disposable camera, or a newer toy camera. It can offer that same kind of no-thoughts automatic shooting or challenge you to learn a bit more about exposure, framing, and manual control.

Another thing worth noting is that it’s an excellent sign for the film community that a major manufacturer like Pentax has taken an interest in film. If they’re able to sell these cameras, Pentax has implied they will continue to research, develop, and produce more advanced cameras in the future.

That’s very exciting since we’re already starting to see more and more film cameras fail as time goes on. It’s honestly a miracle that a lot of these electronic cameras from the 80s and 90s lasted as long as they did, so new cameras will have to take over eventually. Having Pentax’s weight behind it can only help our cause.

You shouldn’t buy this camera to support the idea of future cameras that may or may not come from Pentax, though. You should buy this camera if you’re worried about film economy but don’t want to sacrifice image quality. It may cost more than a secondhand full-frame camera from the 90s, but you’ll make up that cost over time by getting twice as many shots out of every roll.

So that’s the Pentax 17. It’s an interesting camera for a pretty specific audience but it can still deliver excellent photos no matter your skill level or knowledge of photography. Click the link below to get one from us!

Get Your Own Pentax 17 here!