..
Hubris, and underestimating the strength and quality of the competition, IMHO, doomed Leitz, Zeiss, Rollei, etc. to the fate of buggy whip makers and video stores.
Andy
PS: I adore my Leicas, Zeisses, and Rolleis!
Patents expire. All that needs to be copied are details from a 17 year or older film camera. Should not be too hard.
Patents expire. All that needs to be copied are details from a 17 year or older film camera. Should not be too hard.
How about starting with the Kiev 4a? Great camera based on Contax II, but modified to be more producible. Could redsign, use some better materials if needed etc. Might even be able to design in some improvements (lever advance, meter, framelines for a few lenses, etc., possibly upgrade the cocking mechanism so shutter speed can be set independently of the camera being cocked).
Huh, 8 pages in and I just discover this thread. All I can say on this subject is, I'm glad I started collecting vintage cameras during the nadir of their value. I now own so many that if one were to expire per year (doubtful), I would still have many left long after I've shuffled off this mortal coil.
Just going through this thread now....that is catching up where i left off.The Olympus OM got it right IMHO. I never understood why people liked the shutter speed on the top deck of a camera.
A lovely camera. The Contax II would have been a very expensive camera in its day, and a new iteration wouldn't cost any less, especially if the original shutter design was incorporated. Shall we say £4k for a new Kiev IV?How about starting with the Kiev 4a? Great camera based on Contax II, but modified to be more producible. Could redsign, use some better materials if needed etc. Might even be able to design in some improvements (lever advance, meter, framelines for a few lenses, etc., possibly upgrade the cocking mechanism so shutter speed can be set independently of the camera being cocked).
you should see if the Northern New England SIA chapter is still active ( SIA >> Society of Industrial Archaeology ). If you like mills and "industrial" you'd love being a member. Lots of fun stuff all aroundThere was a time before lab owning that I would have LOVED to own an M10. I had an M4 and a 35/2 Biogon and made some lovely images with it (https://sperryphoto.com/an-american-mill). More recently when I wanted a mechanical type 35mm camera I did consider getting back into RFs. The cost of lenses though is just a little tough to swallow. I picked up an LX and the 31, 43, & 77mm FA lenses for basically the cost of a single decent Voigtlander lens.
I do like this thought process. I particularly like the idea of re-thinking the entire idea of the primary manufacturers being the ones to build these cameras as they are already struggling to maintain a presence in the digital camera industry. I also like that the Kickstarter idea is not the foundation for this. A lot of Kickstarter projects seem to spring up and then die quickly again. This isn't true of all of them of course; Intrepid Camera is a great example of a group who have managed to build an entire product line from their initial offering and appear to be making a decent go of their kick start.I listened to the video.
I am going to say that I liked how the problem is posed.
It is large step towards a solution, to pose the problem in a meaningfully nuanced, yet open-ended way.
At least for me, the video invited ideation.
So, here is what I am thinking (and I apologize if this idea was brought up before, I did not read all the comments):
a) Create an open source collective covering film camera, film lenses, film and film chemicals (like Apache or Eclipse for open source software)
b) Invite contributors, create a process of contributing, reviewing, voting/disputing on individual contributions and projects
c) Create a sustainability process (where some contributors leave)… basically use Open source software as example of the process to emulate
d) The Result of the open source collectives work should be blue prints, CAD designs, 3rd printable parts, electronic schematics, etc
e) The non-free part of the people working in the collective would be productions, certification, consulting, repair, etc.
Basically, I think re-creating a camera manufacture will not re-creating a sustainable film-industry.
Instead, we would need to re-think the undercurrents of the business model.
The author of the video is thinking about emulating engineering from the 50s by a newly formed (or, perhaps, bought/resurrected corp) -- but, I think
open-source-software like model would, at the end work better.
And provide 100+ years of sustainability and innovation.
One other thing that will happen with open source collective,
is that existing (or closed by now companies) with donate into that collective their previous designs (that they no longer view as competitive advantage). This is currently happing in the software/hardware industries with the CPU/ISA (instruction set architectures)
So overall within 2 years of establishing that collective, I am sure there will be enough technology blueprints, and contributors to start manufacturing prototypes.
This would be similar to what's happening, again in software/hardware space like Arduino, Raspberry PI, etc
Given the above long term sustainability (covering servicing, innovation, certification, consulting, etc), transparent and repeatability -- I think great things can be accomplished.
Just in this forum board along, we have optics designers, engineers, mathematicians, business folks, probably lawyers, etc.
--
With regards to specific things like type of shutter, mount (m42), etc -- overall I think I agree with the author for initial product set.
But assuming that this Open Source Film Photography collective (let's call it OSFiP) works, the sky is the limit in terms of electronics that can be leveraged.
P.S.
Sorry it was not clear if the OP (@Horatio ) is the video author. Thank you for sharing this.
open source collective...CAD designs, 3rd printable parts...innovation...Arduino, Raspberry PI...
I guess any such new camera would need to sell for a price that, at very minimum, covers the cost of materials and shipping. Given the current situation where perfectly good used cameras often struggle to sell at price that covers shipping and fees and a trip to Starbucks, how is it viable (or even necessary) to design, manufacturer and market a new camera?
I disagree with all this BS about the price of cameras. If you are looking to sell something that is 30 years old and was a consumer camera from the start you will find very low prices. But from what I can tell right now cameras that are relatively new and in excellent condition are going for prices much, much higher than shipping and a trip to Starbucks. High quality gear still commands pretty high prices from serious buyers.
Rather than try to start up an entire company and manufacturing line, if there is a pent-up desire for good quality film cameras, it would make sense for retail and repair services to sell and repair the large existing stock of film cameras.
That is, if people want to buy and something similar to eg an Olympus OM or Nikon without having to take a chance on ebay or whatever, they could buy a camera or lens in a real physical store that gave good advice and guaranteed their product. And if they needed repairs, to repair them (subject to availability of repair people and donor cameras for spare parts).
There are stores that currently do this. But not many of them. A large metro area with a decent concentration of new or old film users can likely support such a store. But customers would have to expect to pay a premium for the guarantee and the physical presence. I'm not sure that enough customers are willing to do that.
If there aren't enough customers to support more than a handful of retail outlets, I don't see how the economics of actually manufacturing new film cameras could work, unless an existing manufacturer took it on as a loss-leader / prestige item.
Certified and reparied / serviced equipment has a value, especially if relying on these older cameras for "serious" work.
Yes I've heard those popular buzzwords too, but think you left out the parts about "Heavy Industry", "Mechanical Engineering" and "Metallurgy". I suspect that building a camera similar to Zenit E from scratch would actually be incredibly difficult if not impossible for a collective of enthusiasts.
I said ‘perfectly good’ not Leica.
I have a few ‘perfectly good’ 40+ year old Pentax Spotmatics, some in beautiful cosmetic condition. Not one of them would fetch enough to cover postage, fees and a $5 trip to Starbucks.
When things open up again I’m taking them all to glass key in the city and offering to trade them for however many rolls of 135-36 tri-x or fp4plus that they offer....and doing so will involve me driving about 250+ miles round trip and paying $6 to cross the Oakland bay bridge and feeding a parking meter and, yes, stopping for coffee and a pastry. Otherwise I’m gonna toss em in the trash because even if I add a nice super takumar lens, it’s not worth it to sell them.
I was suggesting that the Open Source Film Photography Collective would host open-sourced designs/blueprints.
...
The designs would have to be in machine readable form.
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