Camera Design
With the reaction to the Marc Newson designed Pentax K-01 being in some cases so vehemently negative, you would think that he had created something so anti photography that it marked the end of cameras. It isn’t its just a camera. There have been other instances where camera and design have come together and here is one of them, the Minolta Courreges AC301 (A Minolta Disk 7 in disguise). And in a move that presaged cell phone photography Minolta placed a mirror in the middle of the camera to help with the taking of self portraits, now that was some forward looking design.
The Disk film negative is minuscule compared to almost anything else at 11mm x 8mm so as you can imaging the image quality is not great. While I do have an unexposed in the package disk I think I will just leave it there.
Back to my original point, there have been a number of branches on the tree of photography that have been pruned or just fell off but if no one ever pushed the boundaries of engineering or design it would be pretty boring. So when the K-01 came out many people re-coled in horror before ever actually seeing or holding one. Having now had the opportunity to briefly try one I think the reaction is unwarranted. It is different than what is currently on the market but well within the form of a camera compared to many others from the past (Late breaking news a friend just gave me a Yashica Samurai now you want to see some non camera camera stay tuned for that)
Cameras are not merely for taking pictures they are also a symbol of the user and how they would like to be perceived. Camera makers know this that’s why something like Leica’s red logo conveys so much or why people group together to share their images taken with plastic cameras or cell phones for that matter.