I think I have seen the start of a trend and I believe this might be something that will continue to happen in many industries. It started with movies in which writers and directors are going back to the start of a character’s life. Think about the Batman series for example; The Dark Knight (The first of the films directed by Christopher Nolan) goes back to the start of Bruce Wayne’s life. The new Bond movie is rumoured to be based on a similar idea.
Now, think about the product development cycle for a moment. A product launches with much hoopla and replaces a range of older products. The older version drops in price to entice sales and the early adopters then flash-the-cash for the hot new one. This is not a unique event and is witnessed in many consumer product categories.So one would expect that the newest product will not be something that looks 10 years old?
Fujifilm has unveiled their new FinePix X100. The digital camera has a retro feel of a 35mm old film camera of the early 90’s. It looks old school but contains all the latest features of a compact digital camera. Echoing the functional aesthetics of analogue film cameras, the ‘manual’ dials have been carefully positioned to give the photographer easy control over creative shooting. Aperture, shutter speed and exposure compensation can be checked even before the camera is turned on.
Fujifilm has closely studied the current line-up of professional cameras and feels that there is a strong need for a compact high-quality (APS-C based) camera as a counterpoint to an SLR. Using the experience of working with generations of photographers using famous emulsions like Velvia, Provia, Astia etc., Fujifilm engineers distilled this knowledge into months of careful study to create the perfect compact-sized professional camera. The newly-developed lens offers a focal length of 23mm (135 equivalent: 35mm) and a widest aperture of F2. Made from moulded glass, the lens contains 8 elements in 6 groups. This seems to be a competitor to the Leica X1 which has similar looks. The Fujifilm FinePix X100 is due to be released in March 2011 but no arrival date for South Africa has been made public.
