Haking's first foray into the 35mm territory is this Halina 35X. Also found in name variant form as the Micronta 35. It's origins are clouded in history, it's certainly modelled on a rather better camera out of Japan but is very poorly made in comparison. Haking were based in Hong Kong, a manufacturing location exploited for cheap labour, access to markets and had a reputation for making cheap tat. Haking don't appear to have had the ability to produce satin chrome finishes so Halinas of all types are often rather shiny. Construction is based around a die cast body with fairly thick walls, the removable back being similarly made. Clear flow marks and voids being evident on this example, suggesting a fairly low pressure and the weight suggests a high zinc content in the material used. Saving weight clearly wasn't a requirement and I dare say Haking considered that this gave the camera a feel of quality. The top and bottom pressings are likely brass, copper and chrome plated in classic Haking fashion. The covering is faux leather on a linen base and applied over a stove enamelled black paint. Styling wise, it's a poor copy of Nihon Seiki Ranger 35, itself borrowing styling cues from earlier Leicas, notably the frame counter, engraving on top, shutter surround and pointless off centre view window. There's no reason it couldn't be on the centre line, except that the overall visual harks back to to a line of cameras synonymous with quality. Essentially it's a cheeky cheap fraud. It's fitted with an interlock to prevent double exposures. Unfortunately it also can just prevent exposures altogether, as the action of winding on resets the lock, but doesn't cock the shutter, this being left to the user to do. The result of this was doubtless many a blank frame. Overall the standard of manufacture is pretty bad, but... for there's always a but with Halinas, it does work. The shutter action is delightfully light and quiet, it does wind the film backwards on itself to relieve the stress in the film and stop your negatives curling and it is fantastically cheeky. This example is marked "EMPIRE MADE", to placate the British that it came from their diminishing and collapsing glorious Empire and not in fact some exploitative cheap sweat shop. Around 1964 this model was superceded by the Halina 35X Super.

This example was happily accepted as a donation from Claire Saunders in memory of her brother Stephen in 2025. Despite the above description I love it and expended a great deal of time to restore it to working order as it was utterly dead on arrival. It's gloriously cheeky to the point of magnificence!

View other viewfinder cameras in this collection.