Instant film photography is still one of the most fun activities in the photography world. Fujifilm continues to add more fun to the genre in the form of Instax cameras and film. Is the new Fuji Instax Mini Evo the coolest Instax camera yet?
The new Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo is an interesting concept. This camera is being dubbed a “hybrid camera.” It’s a camera with a digital image sensor, a rear display screen and an Instax Mini film printer all in one small package. So what does all of that mean for the experience? Read on to find out.
Pros
- Instax is just plain fun
- Sexy, throwback design
- Well thought out ergonomics
- Instax print quality
- Fun effects and film sim modes
- Mini Evo phone app
- Did I mention it’s gorgeous?
Cons
- Can’t transfer photos to phone app unless they’ve been printed
- JPEG quality isn’t great
- Not much manual control
- No bulb mode
- Doesn’t come with a lens cap
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — Technical specs
All product specifications have been taken from the B&H product page:
- Print media: INSTAX Mini Film
- Sensor type: 2560 x 1920 mm (1/5″) CMOS
- Lens focal length: 28mm
- Maximum aperture: f/2
- Focus range: 3.9″ to Infinity / 10Â cm to Infinity
- ISO sensitivity: Auto, 100 to 1600
- Shutter speed: 1/8000 to 1/4Â Second in Auto mode
- Exposure modes: Auto
- Exposure compensation: -2 to +2 EV
- Monitor size: 3″
- Flash modes: Auto, Forced On, Suppressed Flash
- Media/memory card slot: Single slot — microSD/microSDHC/microSDXC
- Battery: Built-in Rechargeable Lithium-Ion (approx. 100 shots)
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — Build quality and ergonomics
The Instax Evo is one heck of a good-looking camera. With design cues from old 35mm rangefinder cameras, it’s hard not to drool over the Mini Evo. It features a faux-leatherette texture on parts of the body. This feels like it may be plastic, but it doesn’t detract from the experience. It’s textured nicely and is pleasant to hold. In fact, much of the body is plastic. However, it feels quite high-end for a Fuji Instax camera.
The front of the camera is rather flat. It houses the power switch, lens, flash, selfie mirror and a unique second shutter button. On the top deck is a traditional shutter button, a “film advance lever” that triggers printing, a small settings reset button, a cold shoe and a mode dial to cycle film effects. (Don’t get too excited, these aren’t the X-series film sims.)
The back of the Instax Mini Evo is dominated by the 3″ screen. Next to that are navigation controls. The only other touchpoint on the rear is the film door latch.
Somehow Fujifilm made the Instax Mini Evo super comfortable to use. There is the tiniest of thumb rests under the print lever for shooting horizontally. I don’t know how they did it, but it feels good to hold. Similarly, if you hold the Mini Evo vertically, the thumb rest under the control dial feels great. Combined with the unique front shutter button, it’s a joy to shoot in portrait orientation.
Build quality
The overall experience of using the Fuji Instax Mini Evo is fairly premium. The nav buttons on the rear feel a little cheap, but that’s about the only build-quality gripe I have. However, learning to open the film door can be a bit of a hassle. My fat fingers kept blocking the door from opening once I’d slid the release out of the way. Once I learned to hold the camera so that gravity could help, I didn’t have any other issues.
While the Fujifilm Instax Evo is largely made of plastic, it doesn’t feel hollow and weird like the Nikon Z fc. Fuji did a great job making the Mini Evo. I don’t know that I’d use it as a hammer, but it should hold up to use as an everyday camera.
It’s also worth mentioning that there’s no weather sealing. While not typically expected on an Instax camera, that would be an awesome feature. Also, while the Mini Evo does come with a strap, there is no lens cap. I found it a little strange not to include some form of lens protection.
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — Ease of use
Fuji leans hard into making the Instax cameras simple and easy. The Instax Mini Evo is no different. Exposure is handled automatically. There is an option for exposure compensation up to 2 stops. However, there are no further exposure controls. There are options to adjust the white balance. However, the Mini Evo typically does a good job with auto white balance.
Fujifilm did a great job with the menus in this camera as well. It’s a little strange at first, as they’re all in portrait orientation. However, once adjusted to that, the menus are simple to understand and navigate. Choosing the myriad different film effects and lens effects is also easy. Just spin the dial on the top left to scroll through film effects. Changing lens effects is easy as twisting the lens. Both of those effects are displayed in real-time on the screen as well. It’s a good thing too, as there are 100 different ways to combine these effects.
Having two shutter buttons for shooting either landscape or portrait orientation is great. The Instax Mini Evo does have autofocus and a standard half-press of either shutter button will engage the autofocus. Surprisingly, the Mini Evo even has face detection! It really is as simple as point and shoot.
Autofocus performance
The autofocus system in the Instax Mini Evo is pretty simple. It’s a single center point system. There’s no continuous AF. The big surprise here is that Fuji incorporated Face Detection. I found the face detect to be a bit hit and miss. If it has a clear, straight-on view of a face without obstruction, it will usually detect the face and focus on it. Slightly turned heads, hats and glasses did seem to evade its detection, however. This feature seems best suited for taking selfies. Considering what the Mini Evo is, that makes sense.
The autofocus generally works pretty well. It can be a tad slow in low light conditions. However, it generally focuses on what you want it to. I used the Mini Evo extensively over the holidays. I rarely had it refuse to focus and didn’t often miss moments at family gatherings. To sum up, the autofocus isn’t impressive, but it gets the job done.
Battery life and storage
Battery life with the Instax Mini Evo is mediocre. The battery is rated for 100 shots. I found that to be accurate with one caveat. When printing a lot, that seems to drain the battery a bit more quickly. In real-world use, I was able to shoot around 100 photos over a few days and print about 15-20 images on a charge. Luckily the Mini Evo charges in about three hours using the included USB Micro-B charger.
The Mini Evo also has a microSD card slot. While the camera can store around 40-50 photos onboard, it’s nice to be able to expand that. File sizes are small, at around 1-2 MB each. Therefore, even a 32 GB microSD card can store a ton of photos in this camera.
The Mini Evo app
The Instax Mini Evo app is generally quite good. However, there are a couple of negatives we need to get out of the way. The biggest issue is not being able to share images to your phone unless they’ve first been printed. Hopefully, Fuji can rectify that with a firmware update. Sometimes I’d like to share a photo I may not necessarily want to print.
The second issue is more of a minor annoyance. For some reason, photos printed from the app are lower resolution than photos taken with the Mini Evo. While they still look fine for the most part, it’s a strange limitation.
Those two issues aside, the app is great. Pairing the Instax Mini Evo with a phone is easy. You can then use it to remote control the camera. It’s simple to send photos to the app and it works well. Being able to share digital photos from the Mini Evo with the Instax border is brilliant. The exported photos are perfect for social media sharing. If Fuji can improve the sharing restrictions, this app will be near perfect.
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — Instax print quality
One of the coolest things about the Mini Evo is being able to print whatever, whenever you want onto Instax film. All of the images above were taken on the Instax Mini Evo and printed in the “rich” mode. I’d say the quality of Instax print coming out of it is at least as good as any other Instax camera I’ve seen.
As a side benefit, printing images from the phone app works great as well. While they don’t print as high quality as images from the Mini Evo, they still look good on the film.
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — JPEG quality
The Fuji Instax Mini Evo offers two ways to get JPEGs from it. You can either transfer them to your phone with the app or take out the microSD card and transfer them from there. All of the photos above were transferred to the phone app.
The app automatically adds the Instax borders and lets you select color backgrounds. It also has some simple editing options for photos brought into the app. These images are sized 1080×1080 and are perfect for social media posting.
When using the microSD card to transfer the images, you’ll get the full resolution JPEG files. These aren’t much larger, at 2560×1920 pixels. Also, these will just be normal images, sans the Instax border. The JPEG images aren’t much to write home about. Luckily, this camera was meant for printing Instax photos, and it does that quite well. Below are some samples of images pulled straight from the card.
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo — An instant fun machine
Fujifilm seriously rethought what an instant camera can be with the Instax Mini Evo. The camera is so well done that it’s almost a shame that it’s still a simple, lo-fi camera for the masses. I had so much fun with the Mini Evo that it makes me wish for an “Instax Pro” camera from Fuji. Now I want a glass lens analog version with manual controls to take everywhere.
As it is though, the Instax Mini Evo is perfect for its intendmed audience. It was fun taking snapshots of the family during the holidays. It makes for a great everyday camera as well. You don’t have to think about it. It just takes photos and produces nice credit card-sized prints.
Being able to print those cherished moments from another device is also great. The Mini Evo is a fun camera that excels at capturing memories. For that purpose, Fuji knocked this one out of the park.
Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo
The Fujifilm Instax Mini Evo is the latest offering to the Instax world from Fuji. It is a new direction in the instant film world. By allowing printing from smart devices onto Instax while also functioning as a super fun camera, the Mini Evo has a lot to offer. The camera merges analog and digital by capturing images with its 1/5″ sensor and then allowing the user to select which images to put on film. Fujifilm has knocked it out of the park with this fun-filled Instax camera.
