When you say 110 to most people, they think of very cheap, poor performance plastic cameras, with a flash one end, and a viewfinder the other. I had one of those back in the day, I still had it when I had progressed to the Zenith 11. I know this as I made a photo of my Zenith 11 on 110! Of course not all 110 cameras fitted this profile. The Pentax Auto 110 was one released in 1978.
Seen above with the flash and the motor drive it claimed to be the smallest SLR system ever made, I’ve never come across a smaller one. There were a few decent 110’s about at the time. I remember the Minolta Zoom SLR, but that was bigger, and I’m pretty sure had a fixed zoom lens. That company also made a waterproof “Weathermatic A”. So the market at the time did have a “high end”, but it fizzled. This Pentax entry ceased production 1985.
The main point of interest really for us “photo nuts” are the lenses. Apart from being tiny – Pentax adopted a unique (?) system for aperture. There is no iris for aperture in the lens at all, instead they mounted the iris in the cameras body where it also formed the shutter. Shutter speeds are programmed between 1 sec and 750th. There is a “beyond basic” DX coding. Part of the design of the cassette has a ridge, this tells the camera whether it’s a fast or a slow film. As it was never specified what that was, just assumed 100 or 400 iso, that’s what most manufacturers went with. Apparently the auto 110 chose 80 and 320. A bit of overexposure wouldn’t go amiss I guess they thought! I set out (twice) with a Lomography Orca B/W 110 100 iso.
The three photo’s above were taken from the same spot. In the photo of the three lenses (above) the smallest is actually the 24mm (Standard) lens, it doesn’t look small, but when compared to a 35mm cassette (left), you get the scale! The biggest lens is the telephoto, which actually drops below the bottom of the camera, so Pentax made a tripod spacer, to heighten the camera! The middle size lens is the 18mm wide angle. Long after everyone had forgotten the Auto 110, Pentax produced the “Q” – a digital camera of similar size and with the aid of an adaptor these little lenses worked well. Apparently it’s also possible to use them on micro 4/3rds and even cropped sensor SLR’s although that seems a step too far to me! It must be this however that keeps the prices high. A quick search on eBay shows a kit typically sells for around £150. Back in 1978 Pentax even gave their customers a little “tick list” so they could make sure they didn’t miss a buying opportunity!!
When I discovered that there was still 110 film available to buy – I had to try a roll, here’s a selection of what I got!
When did you last shoot 110?
S.H.O.U.T. 
Nice job, Andy…it’s good to see some love for a decent yet oft-forgotten camera!
I have 2 Auto 110 bodies, 1 Super 110 body and a few accessories, but I’ll bet it’s been 20 years or more since I’ve used any of them.
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Hi Brad! They are love little things aren’t they? I can’t imagine putting one together in the 70’s. I never had such a good 110 camera in the late 70’s or early 80’s, but I did use a handful of films in the “plastic job” I did have. Partly for me it was a chance to play with a “good one” and just to re-visit the 110 format. I have to say I think I’ve got that out of my system now! – All best wishes Andy
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