At Fujifilm, the Instax follow and resemble each other. Thus, to distinguish the new mini 12 from its elder, the Instax mini 11, you have to have a sharp eye. Indeed, from afar and up close, the two devices are alike like two drops of water. We always end up with a small chubby case of about 355 grams, equipped with two LR6 batteries, and which will fit in the pocket of a large coat (104 x 122 x 66.6 mm).
On paper, the differences are also at the margins. The close mode is now activated by pulling on the optics – 60 mm lens (33 mm equivalent in 24×36) with fixed aperture f / 12.7 – and no longer by pressing a dedicated button. This mode makes it possible to somewhat correct the parallax effect induced by the tunnel viewfinder, and thus to better succeed in framing your photos.
Similarly, powering up is now done by rotating the lens. For the rest, the mini 12 is in all respects similar to the previous model. It still accepts cartridges of 10 films of 86 x 54 mm, for an image size of 62 x 46 mm. The exposure control is always automated, without the possibility of adjustment. A solution which we know, after the test of the mini 11, that it often leads to overexposure.
Finally, the main difference between the mini 12 and the mini 11 is the price: the newcomer is indeed offered 10 € more expensive, at 89.99 €, from March 16, 2023 and in five colors (white, green, blue, pink and purple). For films, count about 17 € for the batch of 20 photos.