Worst camera designs

[Sirius Glass]

Can we add American (US companies).

Ian

Yes, like Graflex, Speed Graphic, Crown Graphic, View Graphic. All such terrible cameras!

 

[cliveh]

I think the Exakta is an interesting design. Looks good on a shelf, but perhaps not so nice to use.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

I think the Exakta is an interesting design. Looks good on a shelf, but perhaps not so nice to use.

I had a VXIIa. Once you get used to it, it isn't awkward. There's a definite learning curve, though.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I think the Exakta is an interesting design. Looks good on a shelf, but perhaps not so nice to use.

It helps if one is left handed.

 

[Klainmeister]

I had a Canon T70 that was abysmal. My god did I hate that thing and I could never focus the lenses either!

The Super Ikonta copy, Moskva-5 and the whole Moskva series suffer from left-handed operation as well as having a protruding tripod socket, so that if you did use it on a tripod, it would only be suspended by the screw and float about. Super secure!

 

[Steven L]

It helps if one is left handed.

I got to have a look at one, if I can find one.

 

[IloveTLRs]

One camera I have always wanted but have never bought because of the design was the Fuji GS645 folder. I just know I would break the shutter linkage in the first ten minutes and don't forget the bellows. I didn't know bellows could be made out of tissue paper, but hey, the Fuji engineer that designed the shutter linkage didn't feel like stopping there. It was probably his last day on the job and was ticked off at upper management...

I had that camera ... for about 1 week. The one with the crash-bar around the lens, yes?
The icing on the cake was having to use a match stick to activate bulb mode The shutter sounded cheap as well, but it took pretty good photos.

Ergonomically I never "got" the Argus C series or Yashica Electro cameras. I'm aware they also take nice photos, but were unpleasant to use.

I am still on the look-out for a Yashica Samurai (cheap) - however my friends would most likely push me into oncoming traffic if I showed up with one around my neck.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

It helps if one is left handed.

Perhaps I should have explained that while I am right-handed, I am left-eyed, so when using any "normal" 35mm, I have trouble with the film advance and associated paw fouling my face, with the Exakta's left hand advance and my left eye on the viewfinder it's actually an advantage for me.

 

[Roger Cole]

I am still on the look-out for a Yashica Samurai (cheap) - however my friends would most likely push me into oncoming traffic if I showed up with one around my neck.

Why?

If I had friends who were critical of my choice of camera based on aesthetics, I'd get new friends.

 

[Ian Grant]

Yes, like Graflex, Speed Graphic, Crown Graphic, View Graphic. All such terrible cameras!

I was thinking more of the Argus bricks

We had some real dogs here in the UK as well the Purma for instance I have one with it's innovative Focal plane shutter !!!!

Ian

 

[IloveTLRs]

Why?

If I had friends who were critical of my choice of camera based on aesthetics, I'd get new friends.

Well ... I know a few people like that. I don't actually consider them friends and avoid them. My true friends would just smile and shake their heads

 

[Steven L]

Perhaps I should have explained that while I am right-handed, I am left-eyed, so when using any "normal" 35mm, I have trouble with the film advance and associated paw fouling my face, with the Exakta's left hand advance and my left eye on the viewfinder it's actually an advantage for me.

So, in order to make the ultimate camera, design-wise you have to have 4 models. One left handed/left eyed, one left handed/right eyed, one right handed/left eyed and one right handed, right eyed. Or a way to modulate or reverse the camera.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Hey, maybe my Graflex isn't so bad with its tall chimney finder and 2-eye focusing.

 

[Dan Fromm]

Hey, maybe my Graflex isn't so bad with its tall chimney finder and 2-eye focusing.

RB too, David?

BTW, I was recently bitten severely by my little 2x3 RB Ser. B. The back rotates but the mirror box is, as it should be, fixed in the body. Turns out that the mirror box vignettes with long lenses. Vignetting starts around 250 mm with the back in portrait orientation, around 500 in landscape. So much for my little Baby Bertha.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Nobody mentioned the Holga yet. The plastic piece of $hit makes some pretty interesting pictures, and is like a liberation army in escaping technical mumbo jumbo. Basically, aim, shoot, wind, repeat.
But I have never had a camera that scratched my film so badly, and needed so many modifications just to function. For example, the high tech foam that's supposed to tension both spools of film comes off in hot weather and gets wound up with the film on the take-up spool. A very interesting feature. I have to tape the back door with gaffers tape or it comes off mid-roll. I've had to polish the interior with the finest grit sandpaper I could find, and then use coarse paper to get it even finer, in order to avoid scratching the film along the film guide, and it STILL scratches my film (I had two of them do this).

So, I gave up, put one of the cameras in the street, and ran it over with my car. Felt great.

But, to me that is by far the worst camera design of all time. There is no comparison.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

So, in order to make the ultimate camera, design-wise you have to have 4 models. One left handed/left eyed, one left handed/right eyed, one right handed/left eyed and one right handed, right eyed. Or a way to modulate or reverse the camera.

Design-wise my "ultimate" camera is either my Linhof STIV or my Deardorff V8, which have no film advance and are viewed with both eyes open.

 

[Steve Smith]

So, in order to make the ultimate camera, design-wise you have to have 4 models. One left handed/left eyed, one left handed/right eyed, one right handed/left eyed and one right handed, right eyed. Or a way to modulate or reverse the camera.

No.

One camera with two viewfinders, two shutter buttons and two winding levers!


Steve.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

RB too, David?

Yours, perhaps, but alas not mine. Eventually I'll get around to finding a Home Portrait model.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Nobody mentioned the Holga yet. The plastic piece of $hit makes some pretty interesting pictures, and is like a liberation army in escaping technical mumbo jumbo. Basically, aim, shoot, wind, repeat.
But I have never had a camera that scratched my film so badly, and needed so many modifications just to function. For example, the high tech foam that's supposed to tension both spools of film comes off in hot weather and gets wound up with the film on the take-up spool. A very interesting feature. I have to tape the back door with gaffers tape or it comes off mid-roll. I've had to polish the interior with the finest grit sandpaper I could find, and then use coarse paper to get it even finer, in order to avoid scratching the film along the film guide, and it STILL scratches my film (I had two of them do this).

So, I gave up, put one of the cameras in the street, and ran it over with my car. Felt great.

But, to me that is by far the worst camera design of all time. There is no comparison.

The Holga wasn't designed. Eggs from a Brownie and sperm from a mutated Zorki were mixed on a hot rock; the resulting fertile ova were then moved to a dark room next to a research reactor in Magnetogorsk. A few weeks later, they had the Holga prototype, which was then put in production by insane dwarves living in the sewers of Kiev.
After Chernobyl, and then the fall of the Iron Curtain, imprisoned schizoid peat diggers were put in charge of production while marketing was taken over by refugees from the mountains of Albania.

 

[BrianL]

Any camera without the shutter release on the left side is not as good as an Exacta. I think the Argus C3 has to be the worst design, a hollowed out brick. The camer itself isnot bad, just the shape.

A southpaw from Toronto

 

[MattKing]

So, in order to make the ultimate camera, design-wise you have to have 4 models. One left handed/left eyed, one left handed/right eyed, one right handed/left eyed and one right handed, right eyed. Or a way to modulate or reverse the camera.

A 45 degree prism finder, a shape that permits holding with either hand and some duplication of controls (e.g. two shutter releases) can go a long way to achieving this in a single design. And the ability to choose between left and right sided grips would help too.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

The Holga wasn't designed. Eggs from a Brownie and sperm from a mutated Zorki were mixed on a hot rock; the resulting fertile ova were then moved to a dark room next to a research reactor in Magnetogorsk. A few weeks later, they had the Holga prototype, which was then put in production by insane dwarves living in the sewers of Kiev.
After Chernobyl, and then the fall of the Iron Curtain, imprisoned schizoid peat diggers were put in charge of production while marketing was taken over by refugees from the mountains of Albania.

Interesting story. It helps my appreciation of this camera to know its origins.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Interesting story. It helps my appreciation of this camera to know its origins.

You're welcome. Few know these little details.

For instance, the books all say I died in 1915.......

 

[cliveh]

The Holga wasn't designed. Eggs from a Brownie and sperm from a mutated Zorki were mixed on a hot rock; the resulting fertile ova were then moved to a dark room next to a research reactor in Magnetogorsk. A few weeks later, they had the Holga prototype, which was then put in production by insane dwarves living in the sewers of Kiev.
After Chernobyl, and then the fall of the Iron Curtain, imprisoned schizoid peat diggers were put in charge of production while marketing was taken over by refugees from the mountains of Albania.

Why is this camera so popular? I didn’t even take it seriously when I first saw it and still don’t.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Why is this camera so popular? I didn’t even take it seriously when I first saw it and still don’t.

I tried it and liked it, because it helped free my mind of all the clutter that is normally involved in shooting. It FORCED me to not meter, fudge the focus, and just 'see'.

For a while I even thought the vignette and focus fall-off was cool, but have since changed my mind about that, thinking that it's too much of a gimmick. Now I prefer a simple to use Leica, but am grateful to the 'plastic piece of $hit' because it taught me a valuable lesson regarding eliminating as many barriers between the subject matter and myself as possible.