A little over a year ago, the Pentax 17 was released into the world. This contemporary half-frame camera from Pentax seemed like an odd choice at the time. I know that I was skeptical of the camera, and I certainly wasn’t willing to plunk down $500 to just experiment with it. Not being one of those “big-name” YouTubers, I certainly wasn’t sent one by Ricoh Imaging to test it. Nonetheless, despite my initial skepticism, I felt that the Pentax 17 could be one of those cameras that are destined to be indispensable for some people.
My love/hate affair with half-frame 35mm began over 20 years ago. I once owned an Olympus Pen D, which is a compact but sturdy little camera that I had acquired. I think my biggest complaint with that camera was that it took forever for me to shoot a roll of film with it. It was also a bit fiddly setting the aperture and shutter speed, and the Selenium meter was not working. At some point, I sold it. It would be a while before I was tempted back into the half-frame world, and it was via a small camera called the Konica Eye, as well as it’s Soviet counterpart, the FED Micron. The Micron is almost an exact copy the Konica Eye. The Eye/Micron has a circular Selenium cell arranged around the lens, and while I shot with both cameras, the Eye was more reliable than the Micron. I was discouraged by the film transport, though, and often got overlapping frames. The FED Micron had some minor issues, as well, but no overlapping frames.
In 2020, I ended up with an Olympus PEN EE, which is pretty much a half-frame version of the Olympus Trip 35, with its coaxial Selenium cells surrounding the lens. No batteries, no adjustments needed, just point and shoot. With its 28mm f/3.5 lens, everything was in focus from 6 feet to infinity. Two shutter speeds of 1/40 and 1/200 took care of most situations. If anything, the PEN EE was the perfect pocketable camera. Alas, it was only in my hands for testing. Later, I tried out a Canon Demi and a Canon Dial, and both cameras suffered from reliability issues. Since it takes a while to test any half-frame camera, it’s better to roll your own cassettes to 12 exposure rolls, so you get 24 frames.
I’ve never tried using the lovely Pen F SLR, but I’ve held a few. Beautiful cameras, but, there is no automation with them. What Olympus should have done in the 1980s is make a half-frame version of the XA. That really would have adhered to the original idea of the reason for the Pen.
Earlier this year, I tried one of the half-frame Ilford color cameras, and I was pleasantly surprised at my results. Still, they are limited in what conditions they can be used. But for what they are, they do well. I’ve not tried the Kodak H35, because it’s barely above a disposable camera, and if I am going to buy a reloadable half-frame, it's going to have to be a better camera.
So, that’s my experience with half-frame cameras -- until April 2025. I was at the Beers and Cameras and FPP meetup in Bowling Green Ohio, and had a chance to sit down with Trev Lee and talk with him about the Pentax 17. He’s been using one for about a year, and has come to find that it’s the “take-everywhere” camera. That conversation convinced me that I should take the plunge, so I sold my Fujica GL690 a few weeks later, and used the funds to buy a Pentax 17 with 3 rolls of HP-5 from Focus Camera at the price of $475, including a discount. A few days later, it arrived, and I have made a few hundred exposures with it so far.
There are lots of early reviews on YouTube, and you can search for those to see other users’ opinions. My experience with this camera has been quite positive.
First of all, opening a box with a brand-new camera inside is always a bit of a thrill, and especially so if it’s a film camera. Even more so if it’s a Pentax. The last time I purchased a new camera from Pentax was 1982, and it was a Pentax MG SLR. So, 43 years later, here I was, unboxing a new camera from Pentax. Everything was well-packed, and the camera even came with a fresh CR-2 battery. The only thing that I would have preferred is that the Pentax 17 come with a neck strap, not a little wrist strap. The strap lugs are small, but I found an old camera strap with perfectly sized connectors. You don’t need a big strap - this is a very lightweight camera.
The small manual covers most of the functions and use of the camera quite well. Going to the Ricoh website is also quite useful in understanding the controls -This is an automatic-exposure camera, but you can control the exposure compensation via a dial, up to +/- 2 stops. The ISO range is marked from 50 to 3200, an appropriate range for most users, but by using the exposure compensation dial, I could use an ISO 12 film. In fact, this camera offers more features than any other half-frame camera that I’ve used. Operating Modes
The Pentax 17 mode dial has AUTO as the main setting, and you can leave it at that for most of your photography. Note that there are three zones on the mode dial, one in white markings, AUTO, and one in orange markings. The white zone has P, a crescent moon, BOKEH, and B.
- P= Standard Program mode
- crescent moon - slow speed shutter without flash
- BOKEH - maximum aperture priority
- B = bulb mode for time exposures
- Orange P = Daylight sync for fill flash
- Orange crescent - Slow-speed sync - flash fires with slow speed shutter
Having these options as settings on a dial are so much better than having a small button to push for an LCD to show the changed settings. It’s obvious that a lot of thought went into making this a truly analog experience.
Focus
You merely have to set the zone focus, and as this is a 25mm f/3.5 lens, it’s going to have pretty depth of field, giving some leeway in focusing from .25 meters to infinity. The icons on the lens barrel are easy to set the focus:
- Flower - Close-up, macro, and I mean really close-up, about 9” away! The framelines in the viewfinder show what you’ll cover.
- Knife and fork - close-up (tabletop photo) - 1.6 to 1.8 feet
- one head - 3.3 to 4.6 feet.
- two heads - 4.6 to 7.2 feet
- three people - 6.9 to 17 feet
- mountains - 17 feet to infinity
Pretty good range of zones, and if you are just walking around with this camera, keeping it at the mountains setting will suffice for a lot of the images. However, having that close-up ability is a wonderful thing. Note that when you press the shutter button, the lens automatically extends/contracts as the exposure is made. There is no manual focus, so this makes sense.
LEDs in the Viewfinder
The viewfinder has frame lines for normal distance and parallax-corrected frame lines for closeups. There are also two LEDs at the edge of the eyepiece - Pay attention if they are blinking:
- Solid Orange LED: Indicates the flash is fully charged and ready to fire.
- Blinking Orange LED (with or without blue):
- Blinking Orange & Blue: May mean you haven't advanced the film or the battery is low.
- Blinking Blue Quickly: Low light warning; you might need to use the flash or you have the lens cap on.
- Blinking Blue Slowly: Indicates a close-focus situation.
Ricoh/Pentax engineers thought this out quite well. I think alerting shooting with the lens cap on is going to be the most used feature!
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The film advance lever appears to be nearly identical to the lever used on the Pentax Auto 110 SLR - short easily advanced. The on/off switch surrounding the shutter button is also a great feature. On the rear of the camera to the right of the viewfinder is a small opening for a 2.5mm plug. This is for the remote switch for using the camera in Bulb mode. While Ricoh lists the CS-205 remote switch for this, at $50, that’s quite pricey. You can buy a generic one for less than $15 that works just as well, and with a longer cable.
A nice touch is also including a film reminder slot on the back door of the camera. It sure beats taping a note on the back of the camera.
The Pentax 17’s filter thread on the front of the lens housing is 40.5mm - a somewhat odd number, but maybe not, if you have used any Leica rangefinder lenses. In a previous post, I show how you can use a 40.5 to 49mm adapter, or you can look for a 40.5 to 46mm or a 40.5 to Series 6 adapter to use series filters.
After using this camera for a few months, and seeing the resulting images from it, I totally appreciate the design. The grip/battery cover makes it easy to hold the camera, and all of the features combine to make this little camera a joy to use. I’ve shot it with several rolls of C-41 and a couple of rolls of different b&w films, and all of the resulting images have been very good. It takes a bit of time to become used to the vertical format, so if you want a landscape orientation, you rotate the camera vertically. It’s not a big thing, though. The half-frame format has always been that way, and once you get used to the portrait orientation, you get a different perspective, too.
If you have large hands, this camera might not be for you, but it fits my hands really well. Shooting with it is quite easy, and the short throw of the film advance is perfect. Some people have complained about how easily the mode dial can accidentally be turned, but I have not had any problems with mine. Being able to switch to slow shutter without the flash is a great thing.
Overall, the Pentax 17 is a great little camera that can be your daily companion. The lens is SHARP, and finally a half-frame camera has a lens that can produce decent enlargements. If I have any criticisms, it’s not about the camera, but the manual. It does give you the basics to operate the camera, but there is next to no information in it about the LEDs. I’m a very experienced photographer, and I can see where an inexperienced person would be confused by them and not seeing a full explanation in the manual is disappointing. You will find that information on the website, though.
Some have balked about the price on the Pentax 17. Well, it’s a new camera. If I were to compare what a Pentax MG cost me in 1982 in today’s dollars, it would have been over $1000. This is a well-made camera, and while yes, it’s got a plastic body, so do most all the other cameras today. The $500 price point isn’t a deal-breaker. Yes, you can tell me how cheap a used PenD or other half-frame camera from the 1960s/70s is today, but they are not this camera.
I don’t know if Ricoh/Pentax will produce another film camera after the Pentax 17 - which is a unique camera. But if they do, it ought to be a K-mount SLR. Whatever OEM made the Vivitar V3800 SLR (possibly Cosina) could certainly produce the next Pentax 35mm SLR.
About the images that follow - All have been developed by me, and scanned on my Epson V700 scanner at 3200 dpi. In scanning with the 35mm holders, it's easiest to just let it scan as the thumbnail images show, and then you are left with a series of diptychs, or 2 frames of 17x24 in each image. You can then crop and "save as" framexxx-a and framexxx-b, still keeping the original scan. That's far easier than going into "normal view" and selecting each frame to scan manually. That takes too much time and is a PITA. If you are "scanning" with your digital camera, do whatever you want.
Here are a bunch of images from my Pentax 17. Enjoy!
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| example of a diptych |
