Another Buyee bargain costing basically nothing - 9yen! That is just 5 pence! Even with the service fee and shipping it is still cheap, and it works too.

The 1983 Cosina CX7 is a fairly basic compact featuring a 33mm f3.5 Cosinon lens, which is a nice focal length, and not too slow. It is fully automatic with the exception of the ISO slider on the front. The vertical clamshell sliding front was very stiff until the little metal roller bearing fell out - now it is very loose!

It is autofocus, using the Cosina Infra Red System "CIRS", and it only missed one shot on the 36exp roll.

The roll of Fujicolor 200 took a couple of months to get through, which is nice sometimes as you forget where you have been and what shots were taken…

Looking more like the Med, than Bristol - Portishead Marina is full of nice boats, and bathing in the summer sunshine produced some nice images. As it turned out I visited the area twice with the CX7, but with a very different kind of vessel. This is a massive car carrier heading into the Port of Bristol, very close to shore on the approach.

I know it is not the greatest lens on a compact, but it does the job, and renders good detail and colour. Exposure wise it hit the spot on nearly all frames - out of 36 - one was out of focus, one overexposed and one double exposure, so not bad at all.

Summer has been very long this year, with good light for months, and these shots really capture the Summer of ‘26. Very unusual for the UK where the norm is a couple of weeks of good weather interrupted by grey and rain until Autumn arrives in all it’s glory.

Now this is peak lighting if ever I saw it! It looks so dreamy, don’t listen to advise about not shooting into the sun! Sometimes it is better to not have the sharpest lens and the premium models when you get shots like this.

My copy of the CX7 is not in the greatest condition, but that’s fine because it works. It is one of those cameras you quite fancy shooting but don’t want to pay full price for! To be honest there are quite a few cameras in that category.

Considering it is over Forty years old, it is pretty good, and is a bit more interesting than the usual point & shoot, so worth a go.

Cosina CX7…

Finally, after two years hunting…

Back to Playskool!