Worst camera designs

[E. von Hoegh]

My Nikon F really sucks, too. After almost 20 years I still can't find where to put the batteries, nothing in the manual either.

 

[Peltigera]

Dropped my Zenit E off a moving bus on to the road and it worked just fine for the next 7-8 years. It might not be as smooth as cameras costing ten times as much but then, it didn't cost ten times as much.

Worst camera I have actually owned - Agfa Karat 6.3. Apart from the non-standard cassettes, the wind-on mechanism grinds like the camera is full of sand, the viewfinder is far too small and the whole thing is an uncomfortable shape to hold.

 

[Gim]

My nomination for Worst Camera Design would be the Kodak Retinette IA with the film winder on the bottom of the camera. I was given one and don't understand this design at all. Looks like when the draftsman drew up the plans he screwed up and nobody caught it.

 

[MattKing]

My nomination for Worst Camera Design would be the Kodak Retinette IA with the film winder on the bottom of the camera. I was given one and don't understand this design at all. Looks like when the draftsman drew up the plans he screwed up and nobody caught it.

Many of the Retinas have the winders on the bottom. Try using your left hand to wind.

 

[lxdude]

My Nikon F really sucks, too. After almost 20 years I still can't find where to put the batteries, nothing in the manual either.

Not only that, the AE never works in those things, so why'd they sell them with those lenses marked AUTO?

 

[Vaughn]

Shutter design -- Fuji 6x7. If you use "T", the only ways to close the shutter is to change the film speed (the "recommended" way -- but nearly impossible to do without shaking the camera,) or advance the film (but can cause the film to move inside the camera before the lens is fully closed).

I use a lens cap to end the exposure, then advance the film.

 

[Marc B.]

Fotron.

Too big for a paper weight...too ugly as a door stop.

Historic though. First camera with built in electronic flash. However, the designers put the
weight of the step-down transformer for the battery charger, into the body of the camera.

An Instamatic camera with the bulk and heft of a MF camera.

Proprietary film cartridge meant that all film had to be purchased from, and developed by, Fotron.
At a time when Kodak was selling 126 cartridge cameras for about $15-$20,
Fotrons were sold door-to-door for $350-$500.

Marc

 

[ambaker]

Canon Photura. If your film cartridge is not DX coded it becomes ASA 25. No override or manual setting available. Nice....

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Generally - rectangular format cameras with waist level/chimney/45-deg prism finders and no rotating back. There are a few 645 and 6x7 cameras like this, but ever try to shoot a vertical with a 5x7" Press Graflex?

 

[Moopheus]

the Koni-Omega was clearly the case of letting the engineers design the camera without the slightest concern for aesthetics or ergonomics, especially the original "120" version from the 1950s.

 

[lxdude]

Generally - rectangular format cameras with waist level/chimney/45-deg prism finders and no rotating back. There are a few 645 and 6x7 cameras like this, but ever try to shoot a vertical with a 5x7" Press Graflex?

I'm guessing a wire-frame finder would come in handy.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

The Press Graflex is an SLR, so no convenient way to use a wire frame finder. The best option is to use it as a view camera with a groundglass back for verticals, but it adds complication with the focal plane shutter (drop shutter to focus, reset to one of four slits to expose film), defeats the purpose of an SLR, and even on a heavy tripod the camera isn't so steady mounted on its side.

 

[lxdude]

no convenient way to use a wire frame finder.

I assumed it could mount in an accessory shoe-shows what I know about that!

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

Over the weekend I reflected on my bicycle touring travels in the 1980s, and remembered one particularly awful camera I chose before moving (quickly!) to a Nikon FE2.
I am struggling to recall the of I believe a Pentax SLR, the first AF camera by Pentax, which featured an unwieldly AF motor as part of the lens assembly. It was slow, unbalanced, tedious to adjust, noisy and indecisive. It is so long ago (1985?). Pentax 45AF?? Does anybody have an idea? Google hasn't helped that much.

 

[freecom2]

That sounds possibly like the Pentax ME-F? With a 35-70mm f/2.8 autofocus lens, with the battery compartment on the underbelly of the lens?

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

That sounds possibly like the Pentax ME-F? With a 35-70mm f/2.8 autofocus lens, with the battery compartment on the underbelly of the lens?

NO, I googled a pic of the ME-F; the one I had was all plastic (like the Nikon F401, another slooooow dud). The lens sounds about right. I wish I knew, but I tend to forcefully forget about unpleasant experiences, and those involving cameras are no exception.

LATE ENTRY: Pentax SFX with 35-70. I found it goggling images and there it was!

 

[Steven L]

All the cameras that seem to have been designed for right-handed people - to the exclusion of the rest of us.

Ever tried to hold and use either a modern AF film SLR or digital SLR with one hand only - the left hand?

Southpaw here!!! I hear you, it's hard to use your less coordinated hand for something you need controle over. I manage to use my right hand, but it stil feels unnatural. On the other hand (pun intended) I taught myself to use my right hand for the computer mouse. Somehow that does feel natural.

As for worst camera designs: to a non-apug-er, any analogue camera has a bad design. Where do you look at, right after you take a shot? And how do you remove a bad picture from the memory card? Ah well, at least we beat them all with the amount of MP's.

 

[Steve Smith]

The worst design I have ever seen is the 5x4 camera I made a few years ago. It didn't fold up, had very limited movements and weighed as much as three anvils welded together. I hope MkII currently being constructed is better.


Steve.

 

[M. Lointain]

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...

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

I assumed it could mount in an accessory shoe-shows what I know about that!

Here's the camera in question--

http://www.speedgraphic.fr/Pressuk.html

Not such a bad design in general, I'd add. Despite the size, it's fairly comfortable to hold and really quick to focus. Very impractical to shoot verticals with as an SLR, but there's no better way to get (horizontal) action shots on 5x7" film.

 

[Michel Hardy-Vallée]

Any 35mm camera made by a Swiss looks like an ergonomics disaster...

 

[Sirius Glass]

Southpaw here!!! I hear you, it's hard to use your less coordinated hand for something you need controle over. I manage to use my right hand, but it stil feels unnatural. On the other hand (pun intended) I taught myself to use my right hand for the computer mouse. Somehow that does feel natural.

As for worst camera designs: to a non-apug-er, any analogue camera has a bad design. Where do you look at, right after you take a shot? And how do you remove a bad picture from the memory card? Ah well, at least we beat them all with the amount of MP's.

Check out the Exakta, a left handed camera!
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exakta

Early Kine Exaktas had a fixed waist-level viewfinder, but later models, starting with the Exakta Varex, had an interchangeable waist- or eye-level finder. Examat and Travemat Through-the-lens metering prisms were introduced in the mid-1960s. Most controls—including the shutter release and the film wind lever—are on the left-hand side, unlike most other cameras. The film is transported in the opposite direction to other 35mm SLRs. In classic Exaktas—made between 1936 and 1969—two film canisters can be used, one containing unexposed film and a second into which is wound the exposed film. A sliding knife built into the bottom of the camera can be used to slice the film so that the canister containing the exposed film can be removed while preserving the unexposed film in the main canister. The knife was omitted in the Exakta VX500, one of the last "official" Exakta cameras.

 

[Ian Grant]

Any 35mm camera made by a Swiss looks like an ergonomics disaster...

Can we add American (US companies).

UK companies were poor just after WWII, but so were many others around the world.

Edixa (Wirgin) have to be the poorest design/manufaturing capability, potentially excellent camera's dependant on the assemblers skills.

Ian

 

[tony lockerbie]

Zenits may be crude but they are extra cool these days apparently. The Exaktas have to be the very worst to use, ergonomics never entered into their equations at all! Funny thing is that I really like them...oh, and the Zenit too. Thing is I like being whipped as well

 

[Michel Hardy-Vallée]

Can we add American (US companies).

UK companies were poor just after WWII, but so were many others around the world.

Edixa (Wirgin) have to be the poorest design/manufaturing capability, potentially excellent camera's dependant on the assemblers skills.

Ian

Oh yes you can! Graflex and Kodak, the original Simmons Brothers Omega, I shudder...