Having a penchant for cheap second-hand cameras can lead to all manner of interesting equipment. You never know what the next second-hand store will provide, and thus everything from good quality rangefinders an SLRs to handheld snapshot cameras can be yours for what is often a very acceptable price. Most old cameras can use modern film in some way, wither directly or through some manner of adapter, but there is one format that has no modern equivalent and for which refilling a cartridge might be difficult. I’m talking about Kodak’s Disc, the super-compact and convenient snapshot cameras which were their Next Big Thing in the early 1980s. In finding out its history and ultimate fate, I’m surprised to find that it introduced some photographic technologies we all still use today.

  • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
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    17 days ago

    What bizarre over-engineering, for a change that should’ve made film dirt cheap. There’s no need for comically long, fairly narrow, thin-as-possible, flexing and wetting and drying in total darkness. You can smear goop on stationary plastic. You die-cut from whatever length of material is easiest to crank out. It should have aimed to replace 110, not 35mm.

    … and it would not have hurt to make that plastic lens anamorphic.