The Horizon 202 is a Soviet-era swing lens panoramic camera that produces a field of view roughly equivalent to 14mm on a 35mm camera, with almost none of the distortion you'd expect from an ultra wide angle lens at that focal length. If you've ever wanted to capture an entire mountain range in a single frame on film, this is the kind of camera that makes that possible.
Coming to you from Steve O'Nions, this thoughtful video follows O'Nions on a solo morning hike through the mountains of North Wales, shooting exclusively with the Horizon 202 loaded with Ilford Delta 400 film. He brings no backup camera, no infrared, just the panoramic. One of the most practical things he covers early on is how a swing lens camera behaves in direct sunlight: point it the wrong direction and part of the frame flares out, followed by a hard cutoff where the lens stops catching the light. That forces him to keep the sun at his back for most of the day, which directly limits his compositions in ways he hadn't fully anticipated before getting out there. It's the kind of constraint that doesn't show up in gear reviews but shapes almost every decision you make in the field.
O'Nions shoots two full rolls across the walk, which surprises even him. He'd expected the wide field of view to feel overwhelming in the landscape, with images that taper off at the edges without enough detail to hold together. Instead, being completely surrounded by mountains gave him more to work with than he expected. He also talks honestly about the cost side of film shooting: he develops and digitizes everything himself to save money, but even so, each frame carries enough weight that he finds himself thinking twice before pressing the shutter, something he doesn't experience the same way with digital or cheaper 35mm film stocks.
There's a real tradeoff running through the whole video between creative excitement and practical limitation. The lens has noticeably low contrast, and O'Nions pushes the film one stop in development to compensate. The morning light, clouds, and atmosphere give him his best frames early. By midday the clouds have burned off, the haze over the distant ranges is too thick to shoot through, and the conditions are working against the lens's weaknesses rather than with its strengths. He's candid that a lot of the frames will probably be duds, but he's equally clear that even a handful of strong images would make the trip worthwhile. The video also raises a broader question he keeps returning to: whether all this camera experimentation is something he'll continue, or whether he's moving toward simplifying his kit down to one or two approaches.
Check out the video above for the full rundown from O'Nions, including the finished scans and his verdict on whether the Horizon 202 earns a regular spot on his mountain walks.
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