Olympus Point & Shoot

The fraternal twins, Ricoh Mirai and Olympus AZ-4

Ricoh Mirai & Olympus AZ-4 Zoom Review – Fraternal Twins – By David Tellet

By / / Point & Shoot / 4 Comments

Ah the 1980’s when cars and cameras still had edges and when certain camera companies had the courage to design and produce unusual cameras. Case in point are these fraternal twins: the Ricoh Mirai and the Olympus AZ-4 Zoom.

I think the design goal was quite clear: design a compact, high quality camera with a long (for the time) zoom and a large amount of automation. It was designed and marketed as a solution to carrying an SLR and a bag of lenses.

Olympus iS-300

Olympus iS-300 Bridge Camera Mini Review – 7 frames with a 1990s ‘Grandpa Chic’ Camera – Matthew Bigwood

By / / Point & Shoot / 12 Comments

During one of my regular charity shop forays I spotted a boxed Olympus iS-300 bridge camera – a fixed-lens 35mm single lens reflex (SLR) dating from the late 1990s. It’s solidly built and handles nicely, though one review I found online somewhat unkindly describes it as being ‘grandpa chic’.

Launched in 1999 its was the seventh generation, and penultimate model, of Olympus’s iS series bridge cameras which launched in 1991 with the iS-1000 (also known as the iS-1 and L-1000 in different markets). Olympus referred to them not as an SLR but ZLR – zoom lens reflex. The Olympus iS-300 has a fixed, motorised 28-110mm autofocus lens with a variable aperture of f/4.5 – 5.6. Despite the relatively modest widest aperture the viewfinder image is surprisingly bright, brighter than some 35mm SLR cameras I’ve used from the same era. It was succeeded in 2002 by the final model in the range, the iS-500, a similar design but with a slightly longer zoom lens.

Olympus AF-1 Mini front view (open)

Olympus AF-1 Mini review – The Hunt for a Hidden Gem – By Temoor Iqbal

By / / Point & Shoot / 22 Comments

About a year ago, a single white truffle found near Turin sold at auction for €120,000 (just under £108,000), while the world’s largest sold for over $60,000 (£46,000) in 2014. The internet is awash with theories as to why truffles are so expensive, ranging from the skill and luck required to find them to their unique gastronomic qualities, but most explanations miss the key factor behind all ‘why is this so expensive?’ mysteries – perceived value. Ultimately, things have the value the market gives them, as ridiculous as that value may seem to the disinterested majority, and there’s nothing anyone can do to change it.

Olympus Quick Shooter Zoon

Olympus Quick Shooter Zoom – 5 Frames Mini-Review of a $900 Point & Shoot – By Eric Norris

By / / Point & Shoot / 10 Comments

One of the most fascinating parts of film photography for me is the almost limitless variety of cameras and lenses. More than 100 years of human ingenuity was devoted to creating a dizzying array of cameras that all did the same thing–expose film to light–in so many different ways. Finding myself at a time in life when I have enough funding to spend on what are now very cheap cameras, I have been able to indulge my curiosity. All of which led me last year to rediscover 1980s point-and-shoot cameras when I happened upon one at an estate sale.

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