Holga 120GCFN

The Camera Library
Jul 12
2 min read

This is a camera with a reputation - do you love it or hate it?

I bought my first Holga off Amazon a few years ago, and I am happy I got a brand new one in a box, although the company already closed in 2015. I do love some of the photos this plastic fantastic takes and now feel that I cannot really replace it so easily even though I originally bought it for rough and ready camp trips.

It is commonly known for its light-leaks, somewhat unpredictable colour rendition, vignetting and light flares. Lomography have long embraced this camera with the ethos of 'the joy of shooting minus the constraints of perfection'. Mine however seems quite solid and I've not experienced too many light leaks, but I do tape up the internal masks when choosing negative size.

The Holga was originally invented and produced in Hong Kong by Mr. LEE Ting Mo. His company name, in Cantonese, 好光 meant "Good Light". They manufactured flashlights before starting production of toy film cameras in the 1980s. The name HOLGA came from the company name, "Hou Gwong". As Mr. Lee had previously worked for Yashica, he decided to add an 'a' to it, to conform with other famous brands like Minolta, Yashica, Konica.

Although the Holga was meant for the market in China, to provide a cheap affordable camera to the masses, it did not sell there. Instead, it took overseas photojournalists to popularize the camera, after which it was regarded less as a toy and more a tool for creative renaissance.

The specs to my camera are as follows - there are countless models - I wanted a glass lens, which is why I chose the GCFN. It has a built in flash with a spinning colour wheel (see below BWRY). The lens is a 60mm f/8 glass lens and there are two shutter speeds, 1/100s and bulb mode. The aperture settings are f/8 or f/11. It uses a zone focusing system, the closest it focuses is about one meter, or a very long arm for those of you who can't live without selfies. Use 120 film or 35mm film if you have the adaptor.

Choice of aperture, and flash colour - easy zone focusing

It includes two masks to allow you to choose between 12 and 16 exposures. The first time I used it, I left the masks out and ended up with an interesting roll of negatives, overlapping each other and creating a headache for the developing lab! Haha oops. Anyway I started doing my own development after that.