A staple on our website for a long time, the Olympus AF-10 is one of our favourite point and shoots. It is simple, has a good lens, and is easy to use. We took it out for a spin, and wrote this blog with some more of our thoughts about this compact camera.
What is the Olympus AF-10?
Olympus released lots of great point and shoot cameras across the height of 35mm film photography. Among them is the fabulous Olympus AF-10 film camera. The Olympus AF-10 was introduced in 1990 and improved on a lot of features used in previous Olympus point and shoot film cameras.
The camera was released in black, but there is also a limited edition red version available.
What features does the Olympus AF-10 have?
The Olympus AF-10 has all the features that you would expect of a point and shoot film camera.
These include:
- 35mm f/3.5 lens
- Autofocus
- Self-timer
- Built-in flash
- Automatic settings
- Automatic winding and rewind
- Shot counter
The shutter speeds range from 1/45 to 1/360 and the camera uses DX coding to measure the ISO of the film you are using.
Sample Images with the Olympus AF-10
We used a roll of expired Kodak Gold 200 in the Olympus AF-10 for a weekend in the Gower Peninsula.
Because the roll of film is expired, the shots came out with a lot of magenta in the scans. These could be colour-corrected with my own scanner in the future.
Using the Olympus AF-10 was great fun. It was easy to fit into my pocket to take with me everywhere. Its design also makes it less intrusive, so you can take photographs without people noticing all the time.
The autofocus was quick and spot-on for all the images that came back from the lab. The Olympus AF-10 also has good metering to create well-exposed images.
I was particularly impressed with the metering on the camera in these two images. Despite the sun being behind the subjects, the camera was able to retain details in the silhouette and in the foreground of the image.
This makes the Olympus AF-10 great for portraits, in any lighting situation! The 35mm lens is a great and versatile focal length for landscapes, as well as portraits.
The Olympus AF-10, overall, produced images with great contrast, clarity, and sharpness. The images were well-exposed, despite the roll of film we used being expired.
Is the Olympus AF-10 good for beginners to film?
The Olympus AF-10 is a great choice for beginners to film, as the camera is fully automatic. The camera can be used as simply as just pressing the shutter button. All you have to do is choose what you want to take a photograph of and then frame your composition!
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Article written by: Max
Max is the owner of Cameras By Max. They work full-time repairing and refurbishing all the 35mm film cameras you see on the website. Their favourite camera (at the moment) is the Olympus XA, and their favourite city in the world is Edinburgh.