Here is my collection of 600+ “old” digital cameras(old-digitalcameras.com)
old-digitalcameras.com
Here is my collection of 600+ “old” digital cameras
http://old-digitalcameras.com/
89 comments
That's fantastic. And here I thought I had the cheapest digital camera - but I had luxuries like 1.3MP, 15fps video, and a plastic lens to twist for "macro"! http://commonemitter.blogspot.com/2012/06/teardown-mustek-gs...
But it had the worst rolling shutter effect I've ever seen. Just taking a photo in not the brightest of sunlight holding it in your hand you're liable to get a wavy image.
But it had the worst rolling shutter effect I've ever seen. Just taking a photo in not the brightest of sunlight holding it in your hand you're liable to get a wavy image.
Ah, someone remembers Mustek! They were pretty big in scanners, and branched into digicams. Just a step-down from the cheapest Olympus (in 2002 Ukraine).
Mustek MDC3000 was my first digital camera, which took me on a journey through Canon Powershot S2 IS, Nikon D1x, Nikon D200, and now Fuji x100.
Mustek MDC 3000 was amazingly versatile: plug it into a computer, and it becomes a webcam (same as the Mini you had, IIRC), could shoot videos. Daylight quality was good. If it had manual controls, it would have been amazing for the money (about $200).
I semi-killed my Mustek by trying to power it off a DC adapter by hotwiring it to the battery terminal, and mixing up the polarity or the voltage. It still worked as a webcam after that!
100's of thousands of shots later (on other cameras), I still have my Mustek, hoping to repair it one day.
Mustek MDC3000 was my first digital camera, which took me on a journey through Canon Powershot S2 IS, Nikon D1x, Nikon D200, and now Fuji x100.
Mustek MDC 3000 was amazingly versatile: plug it into a computer, and it becomes a webcam (same as the Mini you had, IIRC), could shoot videos. Daylight quality was good. If it had manual controls, it would have been amazing for the money (about $200).
I semi-killed my Mustek by trying to power it off a DC adapter by hotwiring it to the battery terminal, and mixing up the polarity or the voltage. It still worked as a webcam after that!
100's of thousands of shots later (on other cameras), I still have my Mustek, hoping to repair it one day.
Ah, I remember this one! It was essentially a webcam with storage, batteries and a shutter button strapped to it :)
It may not have been much, but it came at a price point that made it much more attainable than "real" digital cameras at the time.
It sounds like someone had an abundance of sensors and DRAM and needed a quick way to unload both of them for as little cost as possible. I'm sure they paid an engineer as little as possible to design the thing because I can't imagine anyone signing off on that kind of design without being totally constrained by time and given limited freedom of choice of parts.
I think I had that camera or something similar that fits the description. And while it was near worthless, it was my only digital camera. I used it for some clay animation (which is more labor intensive than I realized and I didn't get very far) and for that purpose at least as good as using a cheap video camera, something which was outside my budget anyway.
Wait, so how would you ever get the images off of this 'camera'? I would imagine a USB interface would cost itself at least $1.
You'd be surprised. I believe it had the same USB implementation as a bunch of other very cheap cameras, a fairly arbitrary but simple vendor protocol over "full" speed (ie 12Mbps) USB.
My records say it claimed to be a "Che-ez! Snap / iClick Tiny VGA Digital Camera". Which, straight away there's one lie because VGA is 640x480 and this camera couldn't do that. Presumably somebody making a $5 camera used this chip with an actual lens, a sensor and maybe even flash (both kinds).
My records say it claimed to be a "Che-ez! Snap / iClick Tiny VGA Digital Camera". Which, straight away there's one lie because VGA is 640x480 and this camera couldn't do that. Presumably somebody making a $5 camera used this chip with an actual lens, a sensor and maybe even flash (both kinds).
an MCU can bitbang the lowest speed USB connections, and a connector can be had for a few pennies
I had a couple of these! I got them for opening a bank account way back when.
They were sold as "pen-cams", skinny and rather elongated. They weren't actually pen size, but they did sit in a front shirt pocket without standing up too much.
Now days of course you can buy pens with actual digital cameras in them.
They were sold as "pen-cams", skinny and rather elongated. They weren't actually pen size, but they did sit in a front shirt pocket without standing up too much.
Now days of course you can buy pens with actual digital cameras in them.
This actually sounds like it would be an excellent candidate for making a hobby robotics sensor - too bad they weren't readily available (at least in the US). Kind of like the Game Boy Camera, although it sounds like the Game Boy Camera is superior to this one.
>There's no JPEG, just raw data
isnt't raw data a feature available only on high-level Canon DSLRs and not available PowerShots, even on pricey ones?
isnt't raw data a feature available only on high-level Canon DSLRs and not available PowerShots, even on pricey ones?
Used to be. Times have changed and even some smartphones will export raw data these days, so camera manufacturers had to follow suit and provide that feature on their lower tiers too.
The sensor outputs raw data unless a JPEG encoder is present, so it makes sense that they would save money by not including that particular feature.
RAW stills are considered a professional feature primarily because the average consumer's needs are better met with JPEG, not because RAW is an expensive feature to implement (unless you count the additional storage requirements).
RAW stills are considered a professional feature primarily because the average consumer's needs are better met with JPEG, not because RAW is an expensive feature to implement (unless you count the additional storage requirements).
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Care to share a couple pics?
It took me a little time to grasp the fact that this is a list of cameras that the website author OWNS rather than a list of all cameras that existed in 'antiquity'.
Once that sunk in, I was considering offering to send him my old Canon Digital IXUS II and my wife's old Fuji digital camera which we have the orginal packaing and manuals for, but it seems the owner is planning to sell up so I decided against making the offer.
Once that sunk in, I was considering offering to send him my old Canon Digital IXUS II and my wife's old Fuji digital camera which we have the orginal packaing and manuals for, but it seems the owner is planning to sell up so I decided against making the offer.
Occasionally I toy with the idea of fitting a job-lot of Powershot digital cameras onto a frame and doing insanely-HDR shots of scenes. Or 3D composites, or instant 360 degree panos.
Time for another browse on eBay!
Time for another browse on eBay!
With some processing, you can capture a light field and get holographic data for a volume of space. https://www.blog.google/products/google-ar-vr/experimenting-...
"instant 360 degree panos"
Or get the timing right and you could get Matrix style "bullet time" effects:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullet_time
Or get the timing right and you could get Matrix style "bullet time" effects:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullet_time
Maybe just kicking strings that pull the triggers in zoopraxiscopic[0] style works.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sallie_Gardner_at_a_Gallop
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sallie_Gardner_at_a_Gallop
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It looks like the site is dead anyways, the "for sale" page says "-2010"
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My parents had a Sony Mavica FD-91 for a conservation project in Panama in 1999 or 2000... the great joke was that there was an image quality setting where a single picture took more space than was currently available on the storage medium — floppy drives. At normal image quality, a single floppy held eight photos.
The amount of technological improvement and decrease in cost between that camera and a 2003 Olympus point-and-shoot was stunning. I don't think I've seen hardware advance that quickly at any other point, except maybe PDAs around 2003 or smartphones around the introduction of the iPhone in 2007.
The amount of technological improvement and decrease in cost between that camera and a 2003 Olympus point-and-shoot was stunning. I don't think I've seen hardware advance that quickly at any other point, except maybe PDAs around 2003 or smartphones around the introduction of the iPhone in 2007.
A Sony floppy disk camera was the first digital camera I used too in 1998.
The floppy disk storage was amazing, so convenient. I seem to remember the disk fitting about the same number of images as a roll of film, 24 or so.
I still have the files, they are 30k to 60k jpegs at 640x480 pixels!
It was basically a Sony video camera with the nice 10x optical zoom without the tape and with a floppy instead.
It looked something like this (may not be the exact model).
http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP152.htm
The floppy disk storage was amazing, so convenient. I seem to remember the disk fitting about the same number of images as a roll of film, 24 or so.
I still have the files, they are 30k to 60k jpegs at 640x480 pixels!
It was basically a Sony video camera with the nice 10x optical zoom without the tape and with a floppy instead.
It looked something like this (may not be the exact model).
http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP152.htm
Sony produced a device that let you put a memory stick into the floppy drive. It had 3 coin cells to let it work as an emulator for the floppy disk for reads and writes. Seriously.
Hah, I hadn't seen that. It reminds me of those "cassette tapes" that came out around when CD's first came out, so you could play your portable CD through the car stereo system which only had cassette tapes at the time. My friend had one and I thought it was the funniest thing - a cassette tape with a 3 foot wire coming out of it to attach to the stereo minijack output of the cd player.
I worked in a factory that had one of these. We weren't allowed to bring our own cameras in, but it was often necessary to photograph things for documentation. So you'd go check out the camera and the floppy disk, both of which had asset tags and had to be accounted for.
The bio chip Apple created for face unlocking/motion tracking is the same tech that MS used on the Xbox Kinect 360 in 2010, only 8 years ago (iPhone X shipped in 2017 with it), shrunk down to a very small single chip package size. Apple bought the Israeli company, PrimeSense, that MS was licensing the tech from.
that was a fun machine!
The first affordable one (Kodak DC20 of 1996) was actually very good. At least colorwise. Most people just did not know how to use it. You could make panoramas and use supersampling ie blend several static pictures:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/sbG9uneEHakBMMSu5
https://photos.app.goo.gl/sbG9uneEHakBMMSu5
I had the Kodak DC-3200 back in 2001: http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP42.htm. I recall it being great, and the CF card made it incredibly convenient.
It's weird to look at the history of Kodak's digital camera lineup[1]. It's often said that Kodak fell because they didn't invest in the technology early enough and were too late by the time they started to do so in the 90s.
I would argue that the existing user base of Canon and Nikon in the 80s probably contributed more to that - although Kodak made SLRs they didn't make lenses, and instead offered compatibility with Canon/Nikon's mounts. The problem is that the users of those lenses were more than likely to buy camera bodies manufactured by the same company, and not Kodak. Had Kodak offered bodies in the 80s then it's doubtful they would have sold to Canon/Nikon users due to the costs.
It seems they were damned by either going for too much (cost) too soon, or too little too late.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_products_manufactured_...
It's weird to look at the history of Kodak's digital camera lineup[1]. It's often said that Kodak fell because they didn't invest in the technology early enough and were too late by the time they started to do so in the 90s.
I would argue that the existing user base of Canon and Nikon in the 80s probably contributed more to that - although Kodak made SLRs they didn't make lenses, and instead offered compatibility with Canon/Nikon's mounts. The problem is that the users of those lenses were more than likely to buy camera bodies manufactured by the same company, and not Kodak. Had Kodak offered bodies in the 80s then it's doubtful they would have sold to Canon/Nikon users due to the costs.
It seems they were damned by either going for too much (cost) too soon, or too little too late.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_products_manufactured_...
> It's often said that Kodak fell because they didn't invest in the technology early enough and were too late by the time they started to do so in the 90s.
I think this is often used as an example of the "innovators dilemma" i.e. Kodak's cash cow was film sales. Every digital camera sold would potentially eliminate a film customer forever. So internally there was just an unwillingness to admit that the future was digital. So many people thinking things like "serious/pro photographers will never abandon film" or "digital will never have the quality of film" and for a little while they were right. By the time they realized they were wrong it was too late.
What's also odd is that they had really great image sensor technology, used heavily in scientific and medical instruments, and somehow lost the lead there too.
I think this is often used as an example of the "innovators dilemma" i.e. Kodak's cash cow was film sales. Every digital camera sold would potentially eliminate a film customer forever. So internally there was just an unwillingness to admit that the future was digital. So many people thinking things like "serious/pro photographers will never abandon film" or "digital will never have the quality of film" and for a little while they were right. By the time they realized they were wrong it was too late.
What's also odd is that they had really great image sensor technology, used heavily in scientific and medical instruments, and somehow lost the lead there too.
You're spot on and what happened to the company as a result is tragic. Kodak pioneered digital camera technology, patenting their first digital camera in 1978 and developing a digital SLR in 1989. Unfortunately they chose to shelve it all rather than market it in fear of cannibalizing film sales.
I don't think Kodak was blind to the potential of digital cameras. It's just that the digital camera business didn't have the overall revenue potential of the film business no matter how you handled the transition. Remember that between raw film, processing, and printing, they were getting a huge cut out of every picture taken. There's no similar revenue stream in digital.
> I had the Kodak DC-3200 back in 2001: http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP42.htm. I recall it being great, and the CF card made it incredibly convenient.
My fifth (arguable) digital camera was a DC-3200; I still own several (others that I picked up at Goodwill).
I say fifth and arguable because my first real digital camera, prior to it, was this no-name cheapo QVGA camera that took horrible pictures. Prior to that were a series of digitizers (a Dazzle for my 486, some digitizer for my Amiga, and a DS-69b for my TRS-80 Color Computer). There may have been a quickcam or two in there as well.
Anyhow - yeah, it was a really nice camera, and I still keep it around (and the extras I bought) for taking "shop" pictures when my hands are dirty, or I'm in a "dirty" environment (welding, automotive work, etc). Don't want to ruin my phone or my "good" camera.
But I do know of one major downside (ok, two):
1. Slow to take a picture - you had to press the button, and wait - don't move - otherwise it'd blur.
2. Ate AA batteries for lunch - you'd be lucky to get 2 hours out of a set.
But other than those two things - it was really nice camera!
My fifth (arguable) digital camera was a DC-3200; I still own several (others that I picked up at Goodwill).
I say fifth and arguable because my first real digital camera, prior to it, was this no-name cheapo QVGA camera that took horrible pictures. Prior to that were a series of digitizers (a Dazzle for my 486, some digitizer for my Amiga, and a DS-69b for my TRS-80 Color Computer). There may have been a quickcam or two in there as well.
Anyhow - yeah, it was a really nice camera, and I still keep it around (and the extras I bought) for taking "shop" pictures when my hands are dirty, or I'm in a "dirty" environment (welding, automotive work, etc). Don't want to ruin my phone or my "good" camera.
But I do know of one major downside (ok, two):
1. Slow to take a picture - you had to press the button, and wait - don't move - otherwise it'd blur.
2. Ate AA batteries for lunch - you'd be lucky to get 2 hours out of a set.
But other than those two things - it was really nice camera!
I had the DX-3500 I bought in 2001 (and had till I upgraded to a Fuji Finepix S5100 in 2005).
Looking back at the photos it took (on a 32MB CF I bought for USD 32), I'm surprised as to how good they were and how they are comparable (at least without pixel peeping) to a 2014-era smartphone.
I think smartphones, particularly the iPhone, set us back a few years in photo quality where the convenience of an always accessible camera made us ignore the obvious lower quality images that they produced. If you look at photos on social media from 2004-2010, you'll see that they are often higher quality than more recent photos, though we are now at a tipping point where computational photography has started to make up for the smaller lenses and poorer optics of phone camera.
Looking back at the photos it took (on a 32MB CF I bought for USD 32), I'm surprised as to how good they were and how they are comparable (at least without pixel peeping) to a 2014-era smartphone.
I think smartphones, particularly the iPhone, set us back a few years in photo quality where the convenience of an always accessible camera made us ignore the obvious lower quality images that they produced. If you look at photos on social media from 2004-2010, you'll see that they are often higher quality than more recent photos, though we are now at a tipping point where computational photography has started to make up for the smaller lenses and poorer optics of phone camera.
I still have my Kodak DC-280. It can take very nice pictures.
http://www.w6rz.net/DCP_1040.JPG
http://www.w6rz.net/DCP_1040.JPG
W6RZ 73 de KC6SCD
I had a Kodak DC3400, one of the cheaper early digital cameras that had reasonable performance. It took much better photos than it had any right to and is still the most ergonomic (in terms of control placement/actuation) camera I've ever used. My only complaint is that it didn't have quite enough optical zoom, so framing was always a challenge.
I enjoyed looking through this album, thank you for sharing.
I would never have guessed your gallery represented a 23 year-old camera. Thanks for the share.
That's pretty good quality and decent for the time period!
Realtors were huge early adopters of digital cameras. Made getting photos into online web listings much faster, and quality didn't really matter because the early web was quite limited in bandwidth for most people so images had to be small and fairly low quality. Also the highest common screen resolution was 1024x768 and most sites were designed for 640x480 pixels.
And they still show awful quality pictures where you can't make out how terrible the paint is and how much dryrot the door frames have.
And of course you get this wonderful site too:
http://terriblerealestateagentphotos.com/
http://terriblerealestateagentphotos.com/
Great list.
Reminded of my first digital camera I used - the Apple QuickTake camera appearing in 94.
While they were built by Fuji and Kodak, I believe the Apple Cameras predated Fuji and Kodak releasing their own.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_QuickTake
Edit: I hope the author can add this camera to his collection, it's so comprehensive it didn't register when reading on a mobile device that it was more than a list.
Reminded of my first digital camera I used - the Apple QuickTake camera appearing in 94.
While they were built by Fuji and Kodak, I believe the Apple Cameras predated Fuji and Kodak releasing their own.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_QuickTake
Edit: I hope the author can add this camera to his collection, it's so comprehensive it didn't register when reading on a mobile device that it was more than a list.
The picture quality of the original QuickTake was really impressive given its age. It was early 2000s before cheap consumer-grade digital cameras finally caught up.
Taking photos with that first QuickTake and publishing it in a Pagemaker felt like it was science fiction.
Years ago, I sent someone cash payment and my picture to have them scan it so I could have it on my AOL signature.
I remember the alternative was contacting someone that had one of these new fangled digital cameras.
I'm old.
I remember the alternative was contacting someone that had one of these new fangled digital cameras.
I'm old.
The site has also a very vintage look that fits well. And it's fast, with high usability. The past is the future...
This is amazing! This free "cardboard" digital camera from IKEA is particularly cool: http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP656.htm
My first digital camera was the Olympus C-420L (http://old-digitalcameras.com/MorePicts/MP169.htm) way back in 2001. I was 13 years old and had been fascinated by digital imagery. I started with an HP flatbed scanner scanning film photos but knew that digital cameras were the future.
The camera took better pictures than many of the entry-level offerings from Kodak and Canon that came even YEARS later.
I remember buying it at Staples and having them price match from the internet (saving me something like $150) before internet price-matching stopped being a thing (until it started being a thing again in the past couple years).
The camera took better pictures than many of the entry-level offerings from Kodak and Canon that came even YEARS later.
I remember buying it at Staples and having them price match from the internet (saving me something like $150) before internet price-matching stopped being a thing (until it started being a thing again in the past couple years).
The Olympus were amazing! I personally had a D360L and the pictures were extremely good: 1.3 MP and always ready to shoot with plain AA batteries.
https://www.amazon.com/Olympus-D-360L-1-3-Digital-Camera/dp/...
It had a smartmedia (like the Rio 500) and I too got it from Staples or somewhere with a price match too
https://www.amazon.com/Olympus-D-360L-1-3-Digital-Camera/dp/...
It had a smartmedia (like the Rio 500) and I too got it from Staples or somewhere with a price match too
Back in 1996, I was doing an undergraduate honors independent study project on integrating computer technology into elementary-school classrooms. As part of that, my university and I had worked out an arrangement with a local public elementary school to let me teach a class on computer skills to a class of 5th-graders (ages 10 to 11, for those of you not in the US) a couple of days a week for a year.
I had some friends in the campus bookstore, which had a very close relationship with Apple (as was common in those days), and through them was able to get my hands on a QuickTake 100 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_QuickTake), one of the earliest consumer-level digital cameras. As soon as I started working that camera into my curriculum it became obvious to me that digital cameras were going to be a Very Big Thing. The kids took to it like fish to water, they loved taking pictures with it, and then when I showed them how to transfer those pictures to one of the Macs in the school computer lab and then publish them in a simple static-HTML Web page for their friends and family to see they were practically over the moon.
As with many Apple innovations of that era, the QuickTake was doomed by being just a little too far ahead of its time -- too expensive for average people to afford, too low-res due to the primitive sensors, and too clunky to use from the lack of simple ways to interface with a PC (USB 1.0 had only just been standardized and wouldn't start showing up in PCs for another year or two). It died at Steve Jobs' hands in the great massacre of Apple products followed his return in 1997, so that part of the future was left for others to make fortunes off of, at least until the iPhone came along a decade later. But even now, more than 20 years later, I still remember that camera.
I had some friends in the campus bookstore, which had a very close relationship with Apple (as was common in those days), and through them was able to get my hands on a QuickTake 100 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_QuickTake), one of the earliest consumer-level digital cameras. As soon as I started working that camera into my curriculum it became obvious to me that digital cameras were going to be a Very Big Thing. The kids took to it like fish to water, they loved taking pictures with it, and then when I showed them how to transfer those pictures to one of the Macs in the school computer lab and then publish them in a simple static-HTML Web page for their friends and family to see they were practically over the moon.
As with many Apple innovations of that era, the QuickTake was doomed by being just a little too far ahead of its time -- too expensive for average people to afford, too low-res due to the primitive sensors, and too clunky to use from the lack of simple ways to interface with a PC (USB 1.0 had only just been standardized and wouldn't start showing up in PCs for another year or two). It died at Steve Jobs' hands in the great massacre of Apple products followed his return in 1997, so that part of the future was left for others to make fortunes off of, at least until the iPhone came along a decade later. But even now, more than 20 years later, I still remember that camera.
Polaroid made a beautiful professional digital camera, with their own CCD design early on, which even had its own compressed RAW format...then they gave up :-(
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/pdc-2000
https://www.digicammuseum.de/kameras/detailansicht/kamera/Ka...
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/pdc-3000
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/pdc-2000
https://www.digicammuseum.de/kameras/detailansicht/kamera/Ka...
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/pdc-3000
They probably spent too much on development and didn't sell enough of them. That's a quick way for management to shut down the professional digital camera division. They can just buy whitebox designs from China and slap their name on it for almost nothing. They probably figured that Canon and Nikon were going to corner them out before they could really gain a foothold so why blow all that money when they could still make film for the time being?
It'd be interesting if development on sonar autofocus systems continued - they could work in the dark where phase detection and contrast detection have difficulty.
A compound eye of phase detection points, laser, sonar as well as regular contrast detection would be interesting. Each has their own strengths and limitations.
(For context the camera listed above uses sonar autofocus - basically echolocation)
A compound eye of phase detection points, laser, sonar as well as regular contrast detection would be interesting. Each has their own strengths and limitations.
(For context the camera listed above uses sonar autofocus - basically echolocation)
I'm guessing the issue is that there would be few
(1?) focus points available; people are used to much finer grained auto-focus capabilities. That being said...maybe uBeam can find a use for their tech now :-)
https://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/search/label/ubeam
https://liesandstartuppr.blogspot.com/search/label/ubeam
Very cool, I love that weird, hobbyist sites like this still exist. Nice walk down memory lane for those familiar with this tech.
Sometimes I look at pictures taken with my 2006-era 3MP Nikon Coolpix and marvel at how bad they look compared to anything I was using from 2013 onwards.
Sometimes I look at pictures taken with my 2006-era 3MP Nikon Coolpix and marvel at how bad they look compared to anything I was using from 2013 onwards.
I inherited a Canon PowerShot 350 from a dead relative back in the late 90s. I was still blown away that I could take pictures that went straight to the computer with reasonable quality.
By today's standards it's garbage of course, but it was a cool camera at the time. The thing I find most disappointing is how useless they are -- there's no real value in them; they're not like old film cameras where you can still take good, interesting photos.
It's fun to see the evolution of technology, as now my iPhone XS is vastly superior to most things on this list, and of course my big Nikon DSLR blows them all away.
By today's standards it's garbage of course, but it was a cool camera at the time. The thing I find most disappointing is how useless they are -- there's no real value in them; they're not like old film cameras where you can still take good, interesting photos.
It's fun to see the evolution of technology, as now my iPhone XS is vastly superior to most things on this list, and of course my big Nikon DSLR blows them all away.
My first digital camera was Kyocera Samurai 2100DG from 1999. It was actually pretty good, 2.1 MPx, great optics, 4x zoom, CF card. I've used it until 2005 or so. Only for sale in Japan
https://www.cnet.com/products/kyocera-samurai-2100dg-digital...
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/kyocera-samurai...
https://www.cnet.com/products/kyocera-samurai-2100dg-digital...
http://www.digicammuseum.com/en/cameras/item/kyocera-samurai...
Looking at the huge collection of odd camera brands starting around 2001 reminded me of an earlier article linked on HN about Fuji/Kodak transitioning from film.
You can see the point where cheap cameras became increasingly easy for anyone to assemble from commoditized parts in China, which was apparently one of the reasons it became infeasible for Kodak/Fuji to transition their entire film business to digital cameras (it was much easier to produce a decent digital camera than film)
You can see the point where cheap cameras became increasingly easy for anyone to assemble from commoditized parts in China, which was apparently one of the reasons it became infeasible for Kodak/Fuji to transition their entire film business to digital cameras (it was much easier to produce a decent digital camera than film)
I had a Agfa CL18 in 2000. The quality of the pics were awful but it really got me turned onto digital photograph in a way film photograph never did.
I graduated to a HP 618 a year later and the picture quality was excellent. I still have the camera and I could probably get by with it today if I needed to.
I remember my boss showing me a really early Casio camera in the 90's. That was the first digital camera I ever got to play with.
Great site, love it.
I graduated to a HP 618 a year later and the picture quality was excellent. I still have the camera and I could probably get by with it today if I needed to.
I remember my boss showing me a really early Casio camera in the 90's. That was the first digital camera I ever got to play with.
Great site, love it.
This reminds me of a time when I had become jaded as a camera store employee. I got in the habit of telling people that the cameras they were hoping to buy were essentially landfill filler. This website would have been a useful resource for confirming that point.
Oddly, it was an effect tool for up-selling cameras. The higher end cameras tended to last slightly longer before getting binned.
Oddly, it was an effect tool for up-selling cameras. The higher end cameras tended to last slightly longer before getting binned.
I shot some of my favorite images with a digital I purchased for a few dollars. The poor camera quality, vigineting, and surprise due to not having an LCD combined to make some artistic images that I loved.
Unfortunately, the camera also used DRAM and would lose all your images if the batteries got bounced loose.
Unfortunately, the camera also used DRAM and would lose all your images if the batteries got bounced loose.
My first digital camera was the Nikon Coolpix 800, which came out in 1999 and came with a CF card that could hold 18 photos at the default resolution (less at high resolution). Also, it had a serial port connector instead of USB.
I remember the Coolpix 950, quite a beat for the time with the rotating bezel
Nice collection, but he wants to sell it. We still have a Sony Mavic camera somewhere with a 3.5" floppy drive. I think it has XGA (1024x768) resolution. I wonder if the battery is still ok.
My two batteries were both dead when I pulled it out of my closet last month. Ordered one on ebay, received it, charged it, put it in camera and then saw it come to life again.
Slid in a floppy disk and failed to write to it when pressing the shutter button on the camera. Didn't get it working and forget if I tried to format the floppy from the camera or not, if such method exists?
Slid in a floppy disk and failed to write to it when pressing the shutter button on the camera. Didn't get it working and forget if I tried to format the floppy from the camera or not, if such method exists?
Nostalgia. I started my youtube "career" on that Kodak 2MP Powershot, and by some miracle I still have that camera.
Hah! I don’t see the Canon G1. My first digital camera. Metal body. Carl Zeiss glass lens.
Every thing afterward came in fiberglass bodies.
Still have the G1!
Every thing afterward came in fiberglass bodies.
Still have the G1!
I was just looking for the G1 too. That was my first digital camera. I loved it!
That whole line (G) was great for many years, some of the best overall consumer cameras each model in those early years, and much more compact than a DSLR.
I still use it. Here is the fun part. I was able to use a IR filter with a lens adapter and create infra red film quality images after removing RGB layer. That was such a cool trick.
Now..I had been trying to take infra red photos with film for years and I totally sucked at it. It was expensive and it was tricky. You couldn’t use just any camera because anything with electric features would leave a mark on the film because light acted different on IR film/aperture ..it was heat that registered. And gosh..one couldn’t find a place to process it. Every shot was hit and miss. I don’t think I made even one good IR film print.
And then..it all changed with the G1 IR lens hack. I was so excited that I told everyone and blabbed endlessly. I did invite scorn mostly as it was considered ‘cheating’. The older photographers wouldnt stop pontificating about the virtues and glory of IR in film media.So I just stopped teaching people the trick. Suckers!
Anyways..it won’t work with other digital P&S cameras that came later. To me, G1 was almost SLR quality because of the Carl Zeiss lens. Even with the focal length magnifier aspect!
Fast forward many years and I got a DSLR(D3 and then canon D6). This trick sadly wouldn’t work with the new dslr cameras...it has something to do with a sensor light hitting the mirror.(sorry. I forget).
And then I found out that someone made conversions for several hundred dollars but it would mean that it will only take IR shots(images still has to be digitally manipulated..the alteration was inbthe camera..not the lens or lens filter..). Also. It needed a dedicated lens and it was fixed. You can’t use different lens interchangeably. But it was still worth it for me. When I finally got a second DSLR many years later, I sent my old canon for the conversion and I think I use a 50 prime lens with it. It’s an older dslr and still has the 1.6x multiplier. It’s ok. With digital tweaking, I can now print 20x30 prints(Hellooooooo, Costco!!!) that is borderline medium format quality. It’s better with landscape shots than portraits. Altho IR can make a wrinkly 70 year old look like a teenager with gorgeous clear skin.
How things have changed since film days! I enjoyed this one. Thanks for posting!
Now..I had been trying to take infra red photos with film for years and I totally sucked at it. It was expensive and it was tricky. You couldn’t use just any camera because anything with electric features would leave a mark on the film because light acted different on IR film/aperture ..it was heat that registered. And gosh..one couldn’t find a place to process it. Every shot was hit and miss. I don’t think I made even one good IR film print.
And then..it all changed with the G1 IR lens hack. I was so excited that I told everyone and blabbed endlessly. I did invite scorn mostly as it was considered ‘cheating’. The older photographers wouldnt stop pontificating about the virtues and glory of IR in film media.So I just stopped teaching people the trick. Suckers!
Anyways..it won’t work with other digital P&S cameras that came later. To me, G1 was almost SLR quality because of the Carl Zeiss lens. Even with the focal length magnifier aspect!
Fast forward many years and I got a DSLR(D3 and then canon D6). This trick sadly wouldn’t work with the new dslr cameras...it has something to do with a sensor light hitting the mirror.(sorry. I forget).
And then I found out that someone made conversions for several hundred dollars but it would mean that it will only take IR shots(images still has to be digitally manipulated..the alteration was inbthe camera..not the lens or lens filter..). Also. It needed a dedicated lens and it was fixed. You can’t use different lens interchangeably. But it was still worth it for me. When I finally got a second DSLR many years later, I sent my old canon for the conversion and I think I use a 50 prime lens with it. It’s an older dslr and still has the 1.6x multiplier. It’s ok. With digital tweaking, I can now print 20x30 prints(Hellooooooo, Costco!!!) that is borderline medium format quality. It’s better with landscape shots than portraits. Altho IR can make a wrinkly 70 year old look like a teenager with gorgeous clear skin.
How things have changed since film days! I enjoyed this one. Thanks for posting!
Some Sony cameras were able to remove the IR filter automatically - they called it "Night Shot" mode. There was a IR LED that would help light the scene. They had to cripple it when it was discovered that some clothing was translucent in IR.
Wow impressive collection !
I probably have one not listed somewhere... I'll contribute if I stumble upon it : Creative PC-Cam 300 ;)
I probably have one not listed somewhere... I'll contribute if I stumble upon it : Creative PC-Cam 300 ;)
The author should add that it's consumer-grade cameras. No professional or semi-pro device there.
Anyone have a collections of photos taken from these early digital cameras?
https://photos.app.goo.gl/cnMmZQgNNba51ZJYA this is the only one of my year 2000 shots I'd fancy sharing, of a friend I've long lost contact with. This was a Largon Chameleon http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/412DZQG69QL._SX300_.jp... which was 0.3mp and held about 100 pics with no screen to review. I bought it for £50 new and loved it and took hundreds of photos, now nearly all lost in a computer move. I have a few though and this seems to be one of the earliest. Taken in a dark pub, so amazed it comes out at all!
Couple more in day light.;
https://photos.app.goo.gl/mHyzBAme6ZYhsbHB8 https://photos.app.goo.gl/qKpUifHd8ewtWsnx8
For a long time it was better for camera phone pictures, and they were often a real pain to get off the phones and so often were lost when the phone was replaced. I have a bunch of old phone cameras with no way to charge them and no way to get the pics off. Ah well. I still have the Chameleon somewhere, I should see if there are any 'final' snaps still on it!
Couple more in day light.;
https://photos.app.goo.gl/mHyzBAme6ZYhsbHB8 https://photos.app.goo.gl/qKpUifHd8ewtWsnx8
For a long time it was better for camera phone pictures, and they were often a real pain to get off the phones and so often were lost when the phone was replaced. I have a bunch of old phone cameras with no way to charge them and no way to get the pics off. Ah well. I still have the Chameleon somewhere, I should see if there are any 'final' snaps still on it!
Three from my Casio QV10a taken in 1998.
https://rjp.is/qv10a/1998/
https://rjp.is/qv10a/1998/
I remember my first digital camera. I think it was a somewhat pricey ($200) point and shoot. It was around 2002 or 2003. It was so awesome to get "scans" off the camera with just an SD card... but, it had it's drawbacks. It was 3.1MP which was fine for most stuff at the time, but it had this awful way of rendering colors and a few months after I got it some kind of hardware broke in it making video and preview mode "broken" in some way. Basically what you saw was NOT what you got in preview mode, typically with way less exposure on preview.. and movie mode always looked weird, as if it had lost half of the bits of color info or something.
Anyway, I kept it and ended up digging it up in 2010 from a box of old stuff to crack it open and make it an IR camera. Something went wrong, so now it's fixed focus at ~3ft, and with a few bits of dust permanently on the sensor... but, it worked! The focus issue prevents it from being very useful, but it's really cool as it is VERY sensitive to both IR and UV light. Using a very deep 920nm IR filter with it, I have to decrease exposure on a bright day or it's blown out... and it can very easily see UV patterns on things inside when the sun is out. I have a faded shirt that looks just black, but with the camera it can see the original lettering etc as if it were new... but also it looks magenta rather than black. Even with tungsten lights, the IR sensitivity is stronger than normal light and can end up with some crazy pictures that have "color" but not true color.
Here's some example pictures:
* https://i.imgur.com/5ZKmgFm.jpg reading text on a letter through an opaque black shirt (UV/IR illuminated through windows) * https://i.imgur.com/IYzdhXP.jpg an out of focus look out of my house on a summer day (notice red leaves, brown grass) * https://i.imgur.com/STSPbq5.jpg IR "enhanced" portrait in a car. Her hair is deep red and the coat she's wearing is black and white only. * https://i.imgur.com/7gSzCTT.jpg looking partially through a deep IR filter
The only good UV-only photos I have tend to be flash pictures. The built in xenon flash appears to output enough UV that it will burn through IR filters. It definitely appears to be UV though because of different colors used and the way certain things will fluoresce
I've done some film B/W IR photography but with film it's so temperamental and I've never gotten good IR-only (though a deep red filter can be nice) pictures. There is Aerochrome, which is getting harder and harder to find for color IR pictures on film, but even it is hard to predict (though requires less filtration) and very expensive these days.
Anyway, I kept it and ended up digging it up in 2010 from a box of old stuff to crack it open and make it an IR camera. Something went wrong, so now it's fixed focus at ~3ft, and with a few bits of dust permanently on the sensor... but, it worked! The focus issue prevents it from being very useful, but it's really cool as it is VERY sensitive to both IR and UV light. Using a very deep 920nm IR filter with it, I have to decrease exposure on a bright day or it's blown out... and it can very easily see UV patterns on things inside when the sun is out. I have a faded shirt that looks just black, but with the camera it can see the original lettering etc as if it were new... but also it looks magenta rather than black. Even with tungsten lights, the IR sensitivity is stronger than normal light and can end up with some crazy pictures that have "color" but not true color.
Here's some example pictures:
* https://i.imgur.com/5ZKmgFm.jpg reading text on a letter through an opaque black shirt (UV/IR illuminated through windows) * https://i.imgur.com/IYzdhXP.jpg an out of focus look out of my house on a summer day (notice red leaves, brown grass) * https://i.imgur.com/STSPbq5.jpg IR "enhanced" portrait in a car. Her hair is deep red and the coat she's wearing is black and white only. * https://i.imgur.com/7gSzCTT.jpg looking partially through a deep IR filter
The only good UV-only photos I have tend to be flash pictures. The built in xenon flash appears to output enough UV that it will burn through IR filters. It definitely appears to be UV though because of different colors used and the way certain things will fluoresce
I've done some film B/W IR photography but with film it's so temperamental and I've never gotten good IR-only (though a deep red filter can be nice) pictures. There is Aerochrome, which is getting harder and harder to find for color IR pictures on film, but even it is hard to predict (though requires less filtration) and very expensive these days.
Obvious things first, it's QVGA. Yes that's 320x240 and remember this is a stills camera, not video.
The sensor is just raw exposed through a pinhole, no actual lense.
There's no compensation layer to remove noise or compensate for defects in the sensor, so you get dead pixels and other noise in your shots. There's no JPEG, just raw data and the driver makes it into an image.
Ok bad but you've seen worse right? I'm just getting started. Flash is expensive so they didn't use it. The camera has DRAM in it. If the batteries die (which they will after maybe two hours of inactivity) every lousy picture is lost. It's not good DRAM either, no need. They used seconds so some extra pixels are dead or bright in particular shots every time, some fade before the batteries die.
There's a single button control, and the "LCD display" is literally a counter that tells you rough battery remaining and shots taken, no images.
It is amazing. They tell you the best camera is the one you have with you. But if you have this, the best camera is probably to describe the scene in a tweet. Higher fidelity.
AFAIR it's so cheap it has no model number, describing itself only as "Camera" or something.