There’s something about Five Below that makes my ADHD-addled brain go absolutely feral. The aisles are a wonderland of cheap trinkets, nostalgic candy, and questionable electronics that I definitely don’t need but somehow find myself throwing into my basket anyway. And on one such impulsive trip, I spotted something that really caught my eye: the UP-TECH Photo Camera, a reusable 35mm film camera that costs a whopping $5.55. Naturally, I had to see if this little plastic wonder was a hidden gem—or just a hilarious disaster waiting to happen.
The Camera: Pure, Unapologetic Plastic
This thing is light—so light that it feels like it might float away in a stiff breeze. It’s made of pure, unapologetic plastic, from the body to the lens to the buttons that feel like they could snap off with a firm press.
The box boasts an F/8 28mm lens and a 1/100 second shutter speed, which are respectable numbers until you remember that we’re dealing with a plastic lens and a spongy shutter button. There’s no flash, no focus control, and no real settings beyond winding the film and pressing the button. It does, however, have the essential features of “shutter button” and “rewind lever,” so at least it has the fundamentals down.
The Film: Mystery Meat ISO 100
Five Below also sells UP-TECH branded ISO 100 film for another $5.55. The weird part? It’s a 10-exposure roll. Most film stocks come in 24 or 36 exposures, so this already feels like an odd choice. The film is supposedly manufactured in China, and I suspect it might be made by China Lucky, though I can’t say that with 100% certainty.
If you’re new to film photography, ISO 100 is not the most forgiving stock. It thrives in bright, direct sunlight and struggles in anything less. If you’re planning to shoot with this film indoors, on a cloudy day, or anywhere outside of high noon, you might be in for a rough time.
Additionally, while most color film is developed using the C-41 process, the UP-TECH film is technically movie film loaded in a consumer 35mm shell, meaning it requires ECN-2 development, which is not as widely available as C-41 development. This could make processing more difficult and potentially more expensive.
For instance, Boutique Film Lab here in Nashville (where I’ll inevitably send these rolls to be developed and scanned, since I can’t do ECN-2 myself) develops and auto-scans C-41 color film for $12. If you drop off ECN-2 film, the cost goes up to $20 per roll. So now, not only are you paying more to develop fewer photos, but you could have developed two rolls of regular, standard Fuji Superia X-Tra 400 with 36 frames per roll for only $4 more than the cost to develop 10 frames of the UP-TECH film.
And, by the way, the camera doesn’t even come with film in the package—you have to buy it separately.
Expectations vs. Reality
Do I expect this camera to produce the crisp, dreamy results I get from my Canon AE-1 or my Olympus OM10? Absolutely not—it’s a novelty. Do I expect it to take decent, usable photos? Honestly… probably not with this film. But I’m here for the chaos, and I’m here for the fun.
A Better Alternative?
If you’re genuinely curious about seeing what this camera can do, I strongly recommend skipping the UP-TECH 100 film and picking up a roll of Fuji Superia X-Tra 400 from your local CVS or Walgreens. The higher ISO will give you a much better chance of getting usable photos, especially in anything less than full sun.
The Next Experiment
Of course, these are all just stats on paper. How does it shoot in the real world? I grabbed a couple of extra rolls and loaded the UP-TECH Photo Camera and my Olympus OM10 with the UP-TECH 100 film to compare. I’ll get them developed and share the results in a later post.
Not For Me, But Is It For Thee?
I like my fancy toys—my AE-1, my OM10, my Mamiya RB67, even my Olympus Stylus point-and-shoot. This camera is none of those. It’s not for me. But for someone who may not have grown up with film and wants to dip their toes into analog photography at perhaps the lowest price (for the camera itself, at least), it’s a good tool to learn how to conserve shots, how to compose a shot in a viewfinder, and the basics of shooting film.
I’ve tempered my expectations for what I usually look for in a camera. This camera is fully capable of capturing artistic shots for someone with the time and/or patience to experiment with light, shadows, and objects, but it’s a little too unpredictable for my tastes. With that in mind, I don’t plan to keep this one—one of my friends who wants to learn film photography showed interest in it, and I’m more than happy to let them dive in and help them learn.
At the end of the day, this camera isn’t about getting the perfect shot—it’s about embracing the imperfections, the randomness, and the pure joy of shooting film for the hell of it.
Overall, while this camera is a regionally popular, obscure shoegaze band, my AE-1 is a classical composer. And honestly, both have their place in the world.