Although it seems to have been a half-hearted attempt at competing with Kodak, Rapid film saw more success than Karat film did as a variety of German and Japanese manufacturers supported the format. Besides AGFA, German cameras like the Voigtländer Vitoret and Pentacon Penti Japanese models from Canon, Minolta, Olympus, Fujica and several others all supported the format.

Agfa Vista Plus 200 getting discontinued was a real shame, although possibly not unexpected seeing as Fujifilm were the people making it.

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Once upon a time, the answer to that question was almost anywhere. Nowadays, unfortunately, it’s going to be almost nowhere. Unless you have a film shop near you with a reasonably-priced supply, I don’t think the cost is worth it. Not for me anyway, when I can spend the money trying out different and higher-quality film instead. The Agfa Ambi Silette was first produced in 1957 and discontinued in 1961, a remarkably short four-year lifecycle made even more remarkable when we realize just how good it is to shoot. Shooting the Ambi Today The Silette SL, made from 1957, was based on the last variant of the Silette L, but the exposure meter is coupled to the aperture and speed settings. The lens is a Color Solinar 2.8/50mm and the shutter is the Prontor SLK to 1/300. At the time, Kodak wasn’t the only company producing 35mm film however. Kodak’s biggest competitor was AGFA, and like Kodak, they also made their own cameras. Since all Kodak did was create a cassette for existing 35mm film, AGFA decided to do the same thing. Their competing format was called Karat film, and the first camera that used it was the AGFA Karat. Like Kodak’s film, Karat film used standard double perforated 35mm film. Unlike Kodak’s format however, Karat film worked in a cassette to cassette transport and didn’t need to be rewound at the end of a roll. Film would be fed from a supply cassette directly into a take up cassette immediately after an exposure was made, and there it would remain until it needed to be developed.

Because of it’s fixed focus design, the viewfinder is very simple, but also large and bright. With the semi wide angle focal length, you can fit a lot into the viewfinder. The camera’s squared edges would normally be an ergonomic concern, but the overall compact size, and light weight make for an easy to carry and use camera.You could go for an ISO 400 colour negative film, but then you’d be paying more and getting away from the advantage ColorPlus has and Agfa had, which was their low price. Without much control over exposure, I was limited to “Shade” and “Sunny” settings which was good enough to get properly exposed shots on a mostly cloudy day with occasional sunlight. If you wanted to try shooting this camera, I’d advise using something with good latitude like Kentmere 100. Exceptionally fast or slow films, or slide film would probably not work as well. The Silette LK of 1958 is a cheaper variant of the SL, with a Color Apotar 2.8/45mm lens and a Pronto LK 15-250 shutter. Launched the same year, the Silette Automatic (named Silette SLE at the beginning) is better, with the meter reading visible inside and a bright-line viewfinder. Sources vary as to the introduction of the Karat 12, most stating either 1941 or 1945. The example shown here has a pre-war Schneider Xenar lens dating from September of 1935, indicating that the Karat 12 was probably in production well before 1941. At any rate, due to the war, introducing a new consumer camera as late as 1941 seems unlikely. Post-war Karats are equipped with Karat-Xenar Schneider lenses (5-element in 4 groups), that did not use the normal Schneider lens serial number sequence, using instead a low five digit number (14000-) as the factories were restarted.

The Karat 2.8 was the first of the second series of Agfa Karats. It was later called the Karat 12 to differentiate it from the newer Karat 36. The lens standard and bellows arrangement are basically identical to the Karat 3.5, while the body is entirely new. The Karat 12 has a combined viewfinder/ rangefinder and a lever wind. The unusual split-image rangefinder, different from most, shifted the entire upper and lower halves of the viewfinder image when focusing and focus was achieved when the images coincided. This arrangement is very comfortable for use and allows focusing not only in the center. Strap on your Halcyon angled-glass goggles, because we’re about to condense a hundred-and-fifty years of company history into just three small paragraphs. That’s fast. It being made by Fujifilm explains why it got killed off, as the company announced in 2017 they’d be discontinuing most of their C-41 colour film lines. Some are from new players who need our support while others are from established companies who aren’t abandoning the market but might do without our support. It doesn’t have the warm yellow hue that ColorPlus does, nor quite so much the exaggerated greens and reds of the Industrial 100.

Limited Edition Lomography LCA+ 20th anniversary camera

After 1959 many Silettes adopted a taller, un-stepped top housing, resembling the fully automatic Optima: for example, the Super Silette LK. Around 1969 the Silette series adopted Agfa's red "sensor" release button and got a completely squared-off body style. The Silette LK Sensor is a rather late example of a camera using a selenium meter cell. Fast forward a decade and a half, and film photography was more popular than ever before. Features like automatic exposure, motorized film advance, and fully flash synchronized shutters simplified film photography to where little to no knowledge of exposure was required to get a good image. Companies like Kodak and AGFA were looking for the next big thing in film, and in 1963 Kodak would strike first with a new format of film called type 126 Instamatic film. Kodak’s new Instamatic film was heavily promoted to help simplify and speed up the film loading process. Although both Instamatic 126 and AGFA Rapid film are no longer made, since both use film that is the same width as current 35mm film, they can be easily reloaded and used. AGFA Rapid cameras are very easy to reload as they simply require bulk 35mm film to be pushed into an empty cassette in the dark and loaded as normal. If you own a Rapid camera and have some bulk 35mm film, two empty Rapid, or even Karat cassettes, this is something you can do yourself. By 1954 Agfa had modernized their entire camera line. Their new 35mm cameras came in the shape of the Silette and Super Silette series. These cameras were well-made viewfinder and rangefinder cameras, respectively, and they’d see production in various forms for just over twenty years. Similar to the Karat 6.3, the Karat 4.5's most noticeable difference is the use of brushed aluminum top and bottom covers. This model has an improved lens when compared to the two earlier models.

As a budget offering, the results you get from this Fuji-made Agfa 200 film were always absolutely fine, at worst. A lot of people even thought they went over and above what you’d expect for the price. I’ve shot many simple cameras before, many with single or two element lenses, and I know that they can be anywhere from downright miserable to pretty good, and after seeing the results from the developed film, I am happy to report that the images from the Isoflash were definitely in the realm of good. These certainly wouldn’t impress anyone shooting a normal 35mm camera, but for an inexpensive plastic camera that was simple to shoot, the original owners of these cameras were likely very happy. I am unsure of the makeup of this Isitar lens, but the generally decent images suggest it’s got more than one element. AgfaPhoto Vista Plus 200, to give it its full name, is (or was) a DX-coded colour negative film that was produced in both 24 and 36 exposure rolls. And even considering these unmitigated disasters of ergonomics and design (I’m being dramatic), the ways in which the Agfa Ambi Silette succeeds far outweigh the ways in which it fails. Whether you buy some at an inflated price, once that becomes the only option, is up to you. I’m not, though. Nor am I going to complain about it. Not when there’s a whole load of other films out there sold at fair prices that I haven’t yet shot.The 3rd version, which is the most common replaced the top depth-of-field dial with a more modern depth-of-field scale on the front lens standard, and have a shorter shutter release. [3]