FUJIFILM INSTAX Square SQ6 Camera Review

I love how this camera looks. It is a very attractive camera in my opinion.

The Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic was a classic fun camera that I took with me around the world. It was a great ice-breaker at work, fun at bars and events, and an absolute joy to play with. It had its problems, but the enjoyment that the camera delivered far outweighed any small niggles that I had with it. When Fuji first announced the square format Instax film, it was interesting to me, as I love shooting 6×6 with medium format. However, the Fujifilm Instax SQUARE SQ10 hybrid camera sounded like a terrible idea, so I ignored it and kept using my old Fujifilm Mini 90 Neo Classic. As soon as I heard about the Fujifilm Instax SQUARE SQ6, I ordered myself a copy as this camera seemed like everything that I could want in an Instax camera. It was a purely analog camera with a square format, with the bonus of being designed to be small and compact, so carrying it in my bag would be easy.

I hate camera kits, just let me buy the camera. This was the only option for me in China.

I’ve never liked buying camera kits, as they are always filled with useless fluff, and this is no different. I have only used the camera and film that came in the box.

Lots of useless junk came with the camera. Good for a teenage girl I guess.

Inside the camera box, you have the camera, a camera strap, and some colored filters for the flash.

Finally, we get to the only thing that I care about, the camera and the film cartridges.

The camera arrived in early December 2019 and I was very excited to test it out. I bought several boxes of the new Square format film with black borders and started to play with the camera. I had extremely high hopes for this camera.

Notice how the shutter button is not shiny now and that there is a shiny square patch on the lens so you can use it to take selfies.

Even with the camera turned on and the lens extended, the camera is still pleasant to look at.

The new with the old.

The Fujifilm Instax SQUARE SQ6 keeps the same retro styling of the Neo 90. It is small for a square format camera, and it looks good, especially when compared to the insanely ugly Fujifilm Instax SQUARE SQ10 hybrid camera. The whole look and design of the camera feel like an evolution of the Neo 90, and that is one of the best aspects of the camera. It looks great and fits into most camera bags with little problem, thanks to its compact design. I can basically find a place for this camera in any of my camera bags.

This was my camera bag a few days ago. The Fujifilm Instax SQ6 fits into the camera bag with no issues whats so ever. The slim compact design is the best aspect of this camera.

The camera has a very slim profile when looking down upon it.

The camera is super slim from a side profile and it is powered off.

The camera is pretty basic, it comes with a 65.75mm lens consisting of 2 elements with an electronic shutter with speeds from 1/400 to 1.6 seconds.   On the top plate of the camera, you will find the power-on switch and film ejection slot.

The front of the camera is dominated by the lens, the shutter button, and the large flash to the top left of the camera. There is a tiny viewfinder on the top right of the Instax camera. The shutter button is in a strange position, to be honest, and I often have a difficult time finding it with my finger. Very often, I need to actually pull the camera away from my face to find the shutter button. This will improve as I use the camera, as I don’t have the muscle memory for this camera yet. I have shot around 12 boxes of film with the camera so far, so I would have expected to find the shutter button a little easier by now. The actual shutter button feels about the same on all the Fujifilm Instax cameras—basically a plastic button that you push to capture an image. I wish they had a second shutter button on the top of the camera, as it would make taking photos much easier. Maybe if the power button was the shutter button as well, it would have solved some of the problems with the single shutter button location.

The camera’s layout is actually very nice and minimalist. Definitely a step in the right direction.

The back of the camera is where all the action and controls are located, and you can insert the film cartridges and batteries here. The camera has fewer controls than my old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic, but I don’t mind that. Simplicity in camera design is always a good thing. There are only three buttons to push on the camera: a mode button to change the modes, a flash button, and a self-timer button. The camera provides an automatic shooting mode, a portrait mode, a macro mode, a landscape mode, and the ability to lighten or darken the image. On the bottom right-hand side of the camera, you will find the film counter and the battery compartment.

The battery door is a little flimsy, to be honest. They could have made it just a little better feeling. This is not a cheap Instax camera so you would expect Fuji to use better plastics on things like the battery door cover.

To access the battery is really easy: simply pull down on the catch on the battery compartment, and it will slip off, exposing the CR2 batteries that the camera takes. These batteries are not very common anymore, and it is a curious design decision that Fuji made to use these batteries. I have many of these batteries at home as many of my film cameras use them, but you will not be able to buy these batteries in any normal stores anymore. The rechargeable battery in the old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 was a much better idea. If the target audience of this camera was film nerds like myself, then I can understand this decision, but most Fujifilm Instax cameras are not targeted towards serious shooters, so this decision is really confusing.

Turning the camera on does three things. It switches the camera over to Automatic mode, extends the lens and turns the flash on.

The inside of the camera is pretty basic, just like all analog cameras need to be.

Installing a new film cartridge is so easy. A 2-year-old could do it.

Installing new film cartridges is really easy, just like all Fujifilm Instax cameras. Simply pop open the film door, insert the film cartridge by lining up the yellow indicators, and close the film door.

I really hate that you have to manually fire off a shot to remove the film cover from the cartridge. My old Fujifilm Instax camera did it automatically, so why did they remove it?

Unfortunately, the camera does not eject the film protector slide on the cartridge, so you have to do it yourself by firing off the shutter button. Surely this would have been easy for Fuji to implement, and this is one of the many complaints that I have with this camera.

The viewfinder is tiny. The space left for the viewfinder is huge and they clearly could have made a larger viewfinder, but they decided to cheap out at the end. Look at all the space to the left of the viewfinder. Clearly it was originally designed to have a bigger viewfinder.

Shooting the camera is really easy, as it is just a glorified point-and-shoot instant camera with some basic controls. The viewfinder on this camera is tiny and basically useless. Previous Fujifilm Instax cameras had small viewfinders, but they were fairly accurate with the composition you were lining up to shoot. The viewfinder on the Fujifilm INSTAX Square SQ6 has incredible parallax errors for just about everything you are shooting. You simply can’t compose a shot of any kind and expect to capture things correctly. This includes objects that are far away in the distance. You can compose the shot, shoot off a frame, and you will notice how the framing is completely wrong. Usually, parallax errors only happen with subjects close to the lens, but not this time. The viewfinder was a horrible design mistake by Fuji.

I had this shot composed so that the land and the reflections would be completely in the middle of the image, but there is too much sky in the final image. Also, notice how soft the image is; it’s clearly not in focus.

I had the broken gate composed to be in the middle of the shot, once again, it was completely off.

The arch of the bridge was composed to be in the middle of the frame, once again the final image is off.

I had the pipe composed to be in the center of the frame. Luckily I took a second shoot of this with my Seagull 4A camera.

I shot both these shots on the same day, composing each exactly the same way. The Seagull 4A is a TLR, so it will have some issues with parallax as well, but I managed to get the shot I wanted. However, the Fujifilm Instax SQ6 couldn’t do it. The Fujifilm Instax SQ6 is a more expensive camera compared to the Seagull 4A, so you would expect that a modern camera would have a better viewfinder.

It’s hard to believe but a cheap plastic Holga camera has a better viewfinder when compared to the Fujifilm Instax SQ6

My old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic also had a terrible viewfinder, but it was a lot more accurate than the SQ6. Fuji is capable of creating some beautiful viewfinders; almost all of their digital cameras have great viewfinders, and even their old film cameras have extremely nice, accurate viewfinders. Fuji has been creating rangefinder-style cameras for years, so they know how to do it, but clearly didn’t do it with this camera.

Some random shots with the SQ6. I have only shot with the blackboard film so far.

The Fujifilm Instax SQ6 camera is supposed to be very similar to the Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic, giving you lots of control over the way the image is captured. You have the same kind of exposure control and focusing control, but unfortunately, even this gives a lot of problems. The camera has exposure issues. It tends to overexpose most shots, and I have found that you need to consistently shoot on the Dark setting to get correct exposures. I searched on YouTube and have seen that many people complained about the exact same thing. Instax film can blow out its highlights very quickly, and I am used to this, but the old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic generally gave good exposures outside in normal conditions. Bright light was always a little problematic, as this is ISO800 film, but I generally could get good shots with the old Instax camera.

These were shot near sunset and the sky is completely blown out. It was not really that bright outside and the exposure should never have been this bad.

I shot this on the dark setting and it gave a much better exposure on this shot.

I shoot all my shots with the D setting now. That turns off the automatic fill flash and makes sure that you don’t blow your highlights in your shot.

The camera can take some nice shots, and the photos look much better with the larger square format, but it is also much easier to tell if the camera has focused correctly. Unfortunately, the Fujifilm Instax SQ6 really does have a focus problem, and it is very inconsistent with focusing. Sometimes it will completely miss focus, even on things in the distance. Most cameras don’t have a problem with infinity focusing, but the SQ6 does. Basically, the camera is point and pray for a shot that has correct exposure and focus. I find that I do tend to get more focus problems with portraits than with landscapes. Unfortunately, I tend to give most portrait shots away as I use them as ice-breakers when I am exploring new places and meeting new people. Instax photos have always been a great ice-breaker when meeting new people, especially in China. I stand out a lot as a foreigner in China, so giving someone a photo really does break the ice. Unfortunately for me, I seldom wait for the photo to develop completely before I give it away. I usually shoot and give it to the person immediately, so I have no idea how many people have gotten soft-focus photos. But this is a huge deal for me. Cameras need to autofocus well or give me manual focus options so I can make sure that the shot works out.

A quick shot of one of my photography friends here in China, the shot is completely out of focus.

This shot is also soft and out of focus. I have never seen such inconsistency from an Instax camera before.

I wish the camera was better at the basics of taking photos, and luck wasn’t such a huge factor. When you get things right, it can produce some nice-looking shots. I really do prefer the larger square form factor, but right now I have moved back to shooting with the old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic, as at least I can get consistent results.

I find getting your horizon straight in the small viewfinder extremely difficult. Again I shot with the Dark setting to make sure I didn’t blow the highlights. Notice that the sun still was blown out and shows up as a small black dot. That is common with Fujifilm Instax photos.

Right now, there are only color film packs for the square format, one with white borders and one with black borders. I think the black-bordered version of the film is fantastic looking, but I hope Fujifilm will bring out some black-and-white film in the future.

I wish I could say that I think this camera is a good buy, but I can’t. This is one of the worst cameras that I have ever bought. Getting good photos is completely based on pure luck, and it breaks my heart as I would love to be able to use this camera as I did with the old Fujifilm Instax Mini 90 Neo Classic. I want to take it with me to work or when I go out with my friends. I love shooting analog stuff, and it is much more enjoyable seeing the small prints than looking at shots on my phone or computer. Maybe I got a bad copy of the camera, or perhaps this Instax model just isn’t good. It’s hard to tell, but the camera was a complete waste of money for me. When a cheap plastic Holga can take better photos than a new modern analog camera, then you know that something is wrong. Come on, Fuji, you can do so much better than this.

Pros

• Small and light.
• Looks good
• Feels good in the hand.

Cons

• The film can get a little expensive
• Massive focus issues
• The viewfinder is tiny and has major parallax errors.