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Conran Camera Concept, Yea or Nay?

By Ray Hu - April 11, 2013

in Tech

All images courtesy of BBC/Darren Russell

BBC Future recently invited Conran's Jared Mankelow to rethink the camera for their series on "redesigning the everyday," Imagineering, in which "top designers rethink common objects and offer 21st Century solutions." The Senior Designer at Sir Terence's venerable company did away with the screen-based interface, hearkening back to the "retro joys of analogue photography"—namely, "that old-school feeling of waiting for your photographs to be developed before seeing how they turned out."

Mankelow's concept consists of a simple square, roughly the size of a Post-It pad, featuring a distinctive central aperture that serves as the lens and viewfinder, "with two rings at the front for the imaging sensors (black) and a ringflash (white)."The square snapper may only be a mock-up—made by the UK's Complete Fabrications—but it includes many of the attributes Mankelow would like in a finished product. Firstly there is the weight—the design's reassuring heaviness harks back to the chunky character of models from the 1970s, when old-school film cameras arguably reached their golden age.

The lack of screen, of course, is the most radical departure from existing digital camera design. Noting the availability of wireless screens—smartphones, tablets, etc.—Mankelow has opted to relegate preview images to mobile devices via Bluetooth instead of in the camera itself. Not only does this add the element of surprise, as in film photography, but it also serves to reduce battery usage.

I also was interested to hear Mankelow's that reasoning for the pared-down design echoes NewDealDesign's approach to the Lytro Light Field Camera: "Current camera devices are steeped in antiquated gestalt, born of reflex cameras with the need to house mirrors and film. Despite evolving to digital, the industry kept the slab with the pointy lens—we recognized Lytro as a chance to evolve this entrenched paradigm."

Still, I can't help but noticed that the form factor resembles that of the recently-announced Instagram camera—surely a case of convergent thinking as opposed to a knockoff. And to Mankelow's credit, his camera concept is essentially a reaction to technologically-enabled instant gratification, and the design is far superior to the rather more cartoonish Instagram one.

It ain't Google Glass, but that's sort of the point...

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Jerry O'Leary

11 years ago

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There's an opportunity to break the legacy of the circular lens by making the viewing area a rectangular through hole.....letting the user 'frame' their shot.
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PDXIII

11 years ago

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It's a great object. I really like the idea that you cannot immediately see your pictures. The camera seems very stable and easy to use, so you can give them to your kids in an early age, something you shouldn't do with your smartphone. Maybe its construction allows it to be used under water.

The more I think about it, the more I love it!
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Angus

11 years ago

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The controls of this camera exhibits some old thinking... interaction design has come a long way and there are more intuitive ways to interact with a camera.
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nick lau

11 years ago

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wait. you have a camera that needs a smartphone/tablet to view the pictures you just took. while they themselves have cameras. this is a primary product that comes across as a modular entity.
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Matthieu Libeert

11 years ago

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Talking about everyone having a smartphone or tablet with high resolution. Those smartphone nowadays have good cameras and HD 1080p filming on it, why would I want to walk around with another device in my pocket, just to take pictures and view the pictures on my smartphone if I want to? If I just want to take random pictures of random things in life I take my smartphone, If I want to take "better" pictures I take a reflexcamera... sounds like a useless gadget to me, maybe I'm missing something..
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