R E T R O
Retro. “A style of an earlier time.”
Growing up and more so in the last twenty years the word retro has been used to describe, clothing, music, automobiles, furniture, and on and on. When manufacturers us a “retro” design they are attempting to stir up warm memories of things people loved when they were younger and in a way go back to an era of time gone by that represented a simpler yet perhaps a better life
In the last few years some camera manufacturers have decided that “retro” sells.
Now remember we are talking about style, which is a look and not necessarily function.
Today most of the people I know shoot digital and were at sometime in their lives film shooters. Many of those friends like myself are old enough to remember earlier generations of cameras including rangefinder as well as compacts. These cameras represented a breed of cameras with great optics and excellent builds. Some of those had lenses that were fixed, non removable and others, i.e., Leica rangefinders, had small, interchangeable lenses.
You might see some of them in the used camera departments of a camera stores and maybe even handle them. Look for Leica M cameras, Contax, Minolta, and Konica. These were simple to use cameras with a simple set of controls.
But I am drifting from my subject. Retro design.
In the last several years there have been cameras introduced that are emulating the design of camera styles gone by and have successfully incorporated digital into these new OLDER LOOKING cameras and lenses. I like them.
Olympus was to my knowledge the first to come out with a retro design called the Pen. It was supposed to be similar to the original Pen F half frame camera from many years ago. They were pretty successful with the design of their Pen E-P1, 2 and 3. Three generations, all less than a year apart. It has the look of their flat headed single lens reflex camera and is about the same size. Not a pocket camera but most certainly a coat pocket camera. They have also introduced a series of prime lenses that take on the look of old rangefinder type lenses. However, it is a digital camera with a micro four thirds sensor.
Nikon has introduced their P7000 series small sensor cameras with fixed lenses and they have a tiny bit of a retro look. Canon has their G series, i.e., G11 or 12, and they are similar to the Nikon or maybe it's the other way around. But they are fixed lenses. The sensor, finger nail size tiny point and shoot sensors.
Fuji who has been so very quiet for so very long jumped in this year with the X100. It has a fixed lens, equal to a 35mm f/2.0. It looks like a range finder camera and to some degree has modeled itself after the Leica M9 interchangeable lens camera. It is a beautiful, high quality, precision instrument. However, they are the most expensive around as well. A Leica M9 body will cost you $8,000 without any lenses.
The Fuji which is a pure digital camera from top to bottom really has a beautiful retro, Leica like design and one of the best sensors in the business. There are very strong rumors that they are adding another retro body but this time it will have interchangeable Fuji lenses. Fuji has always been known in certain circles as some of the best made lenses.
Finally a retro design but different, the Ricoh GXR camera. This camera is a compact camera that is built like a granite mountain. It has a very basic boxy design and uses lens modules. There are AF modules, which contain the optics and sensors for each individual lens design, but more interesting to me is the “M” module. It takes all of the Leica, Voigtlander, and any other manual focus M lenses and incorporates them with a simple but highly effective camera body boasting the simplicity of day gone by. The M module itself is 12 megapixel.
So why is retro suddenly the NEW OLD DESIGN in the market place? I guess I can use the old expression “things that go around come around.” But for me, I find the design very comfortable and portable for my kinds of photography. There are just some things that feel better than others and the retro design of a camera using today’s technologies just really does it for me. I like the look, the feel, and the comfort. Now these are all esthetic things but they are as important as the technologies.
Like other things from times gone by, it just feels good. But like anything else, because we are individuals so are our tastes. Happy shooting.
