Design Appeal

[nikkortorokkor]

Whilst culling the camera collection prior to going overseas for work, I passed some of my favourites on to our daughter - an industrial design student in the final year of her degree. She and her boyfriend had already used some of my classics, and seemed to enjoy doing so.

Her eyes lit up at a couple of shelf queens, a Ricoh



and the 'baby' Yashica 44



which I gave to her as future office decorations.

I was quite tickled because these are two of my favourite 'pretty wee cameras'. I know that the Yashi is a shameless crib of the baby Rollei, but it is beguiling nevertheless - and the Richo Auto-35 (little brother to the Richomatic 35 rangefinder) shows just how well-made a plastic point and shoot camera can be:



Intersting that a young designer, born 25 years after the heyday of these cameras, should be so intrigued by them.

By comparison, I was in a big box retailer the other day and, out of curiosity, picked up a low end-Canon DSLR. Now in terms of bang for buck image making ability, the Canon was probably great value for money. But in terms of build quality and design clarity - eugh! It is not a tool that anyone would have great faith in. My 50 dollar MP3 player feels better made, as does my eighty dollar mobile phone. And that isn't a very high bar to climb over.

Some have questioned the wisdom of expensive digital cameras with high build quality and limited purpose - eg The Fuji X100 - (though I know the firmware design of that example leaves something to be desired) - writing them off as exercises in vanity in a technologically volatile market. Well, maybe. Yet watching my daughter and her boyfriend (another young designer) handle and use cameras built around 50 years ago and get a big kick out of doing so, makes me think that for those of us who take photos for fun, spending our money on design quality over features isn't really that bad after all. it is something which will dictate my next choice of camera.

[mickeyobe]

Michael,

From the point of view of a mere layman, the Ricoh is, indeed, a beautiful creation.

From the point of view of me, a gadget happy camera collector, the Yashica appears superb.

It is gratifying that my tastes are not antithetical to the pros, at least in cameras.

I wonder what those young designers would think of the Exakta VX IIa which I came to regard as beautiful only after using it for long time. Sometimes familiarity breeds aesthetic appreciation that might not meet the criteria of a professional designer.

Mickey

[photax]

Hi Michael !

Two beautiful cameras ! The Ricoh reminds me of the Russian Zorki 10 and 11 models.

MIK

[daveh]

Beauty is, as always, in the eye of the beholder.

It seems to me that each camera built is made to fit a hole in the market - or at least to join some other firm's filler and so compete with it. Some will be expensive, others cheap. Some firms choose one end of the market, e.g. Leica, while others decide to produce for the masses. Some companies, of course, cover all eventualities. I would suggest Canon is one of these.

Of course within any 'type' there is always a model that stands out for design while another will for build quality. Sometimes something comes along and everything is right. Then technology moves on and what is left? Just a pretty lump that sits on a shelf.

I like the Ricoh. It has been designed with a bit of thought to its appearance, and its function. It might be, though, that it is awful for what it is intended to do - take photos.

I can't say that the Yashica does much for me design-wise, whether pinched from Rollei or not. I'm sure the design is functional, but I don't think it stands out in other ways.

Returning to Canon: When I bought my first Canon DSLR, a 30D, I bought it with the standard zoom lens (which I think is a 28-80). Bizarrely the body only was more expensive than the kit when I bought it. I have never used that lens other than for the first trial shots. It's horrible, with a cheap plasticky feel. At the other end I have the 70-200 L lens which has build quality built in, as it were: mechanically robust and optically superb, coupled with the fastest autofocus going. It's trendy white too.

[Deleted]

I've always thought the Yashica 44 was a beautiful camera. Too bad it shoots 127 film.

W.