Opticallimits

Sony bought the DSLR and lens part of (Konica) Minolta early 2006. This brought us the Sony Alpha A100, Sony's first DSLR.



Right?



Not quite. Sony has had a range of DSLRs before, starting in 1998 with the Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-D700, an 1.5mp DSLR. In 1999 it was followed up by the improved 1.5mp DSC-D770, and the "professional" 1.5mp DKC-FP3, which sported a firewire connection.



Sony then beat Canon and Nikon to market with a DSLR. Canon only introduced its first DSLR in early 2000 (the D30). And Nikon introduced their first DSLR in the 2nd quarter of 1999 (the professional D1).



The Cyber-Shot DSC-D700:

Minolta was the first manufacturer to introduce an autofocus DSLR system camera, in 1985 (with the Minolta (Maxxum)(Alpha) 7000(AF). Nikon followed a year later with the Nikon F-501 and Canon with the EOS 650 in 1987.



Right?



Only if we disregard Nikon's earlier efforts...



In 1971 (!!!) Nikon introduced the F2, to follow up the legendary F. With it, Nikon also showed a 80mm (or 85mm, sources differ here) f4.5 AF lens which weighed a mere 2.7 kilos.





In 1982 Nikon showed the F3 AF, with two AF lenses: a 80mm f2.8, and 200mm f3.5 IF-ED.

Nikon F3 AF with 80mm f2.8:

Retro is in fashion, in camera land. Just have a look at the Canon G series, the Nikon P7000/7100, different Panasonic models, Fuji X series, the new Olympus E-M5 to name a few.



But what is retro styling? Basically what cameras looked like before Canon's last manual focus SLR, the Canon T90. Designed by the German industrial designer Luigi Colani, it influenced how (D)SLRs have looked the past few decades. One can wonder if Pentax' new K-01, another camera designed by an influential designer, will have a similar impact in camera design.



T90:

http://www.kameramuseum.de/0-fotokameras...n-t-90.jpg

With Kodak falling apart, in commentary you often hear and read that Kodak missed the digital boat, and failed to make the transition from film to digital.



This is not true, though. In fact, Kodak can be credited as the company that invented the first digital camera in 1975 with a 10.000 pixel (0.01mp) black and white sensor (one year later, Brice Bayer developed a colour filter).

It stored images on cassette tape.





Kodak was the 1st to market professional digital DSLRs, starting with the 1.3mp DCS (based on a Nikon F3 body) in 1991. Kodak has been pursuing the consumer market since 1995. Kodak just has not been all too successful in competing in the crowded digital camera market.

A nice brief documentary BC... I liked that toaster with 0.01MP resolution <img src='http://forum.photozone.de/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />. And the data recording medium is a cassette tape... It reminds me old times when I was trying to "listen" to the data of my Commodore 64 games <img src='http://forum.photozone.de/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />...

Those Sony cameras are not DSLRs. They neither have a mirror, nor optical TTL viewfinder. First Sony DSLR was produced after they bought Minolta's camera business. First commercially available DSLR was produced by Kodak in 1991, the DCS-100, based on NIkon F3 body.

[quote name='Yugi' timestamp='1329857243' post='16002']

Those Sony cameras are not DSLRs. They neither have a mirror, nor optical TTL viewfinder.

[/quote]



I'm afraid you're wrong here, the DSC-D700 indeed featured an optical TTL viewfinder and a mirror... a fixed semi transparent mirror, btw., so they've used that idea already many years ago.



-- Markus

[quote name='mst' timestamp='1329860484' post='16004']

.....featured an optical TTL viewfinder and a mirror... a fixed semi transparent mirror, btw., so they've used that idea already many years ago.

-- Markus

[/quote]

....and they had a lot of unused stm's left over...and now recovered from the back of the company storeroom...waste not want not....

[quote name='mst' timestamp='1329860484' post='16004']

I'm afraid you're wrong here, the DSC-D700 indeed featured an optical TTL viewfinder and a mirror... a fixed semi transparent mirror, btw., so they've used that idea already many years ago.



-- Markus

[/quote]

Yes, you're right.

Who brought to market the first digital camera (affordable for "consumers"... so not counting the astronomically priced stuff aimed at a select group of professionals, like Kodak's DCS)?



Kodak? No. Kodak introduced its first digital stills camera for the normal market in 1995, the Kodak DC40.

Sony yes... no. Sony brought the Sony Mavica to market in 1981. It had a 0.3mp CCD.. but it was not a digital camera. It put out a video signal instead of digital images. Sony's first digital camera appeared in 1997, the DSC-F1. And it was not marketed for real.

Olympus? No. 1st one was the C-400 in 1996.

Canon? No. Like the Mavica, Canon introduced the RC-701 in 1985 and actually sold them, but its output was not digital but video. In 1996 Canon came with its first, the Canon PowerShot 600.

Nikon? No. Like Sony and Canon, Nikon introduced a stills video camera in 1988, the QV-1000C. 1st digital for Nikon: The Coolpix 100 from 1997.

Fujifilm? No.. First digital camera in 1998, the DS-1P.



So who was the first? There are actually two answers. Both were outsiders in the photo world.



The 1st digital camera was the Dycam Model 1, in 1990. It was also sold as Logitech FotoMan. It had a whopping resolution of 320x240 pixels, and shot black and white images only.





The 1st consumer digital colour camera was the Apple QuickTake 100, which offered a for the time reasonable resolution of 640x480 pixels (0.3mp). It was developed together with Kodak and produced by Kodak. The Kodak DC40 shows a close resemblance to the Apple QuickTake 100.