gjw@clyde.UUCP (Gregory J. Wroclawski) (05/30/85)
Sony jumped into the 8mm camcorder fray today by annoucing its entry into the 8mm market. An article in the May 29,1985 New York Times described it very loosly. A full page ad in the same paper showed a artists picture of it. Its described as the size of a large paperback. Weighs approximately 3 lbs. with cassette and battery. The drawing of it indicated it had a relatively small lens to keep the size and weight down. It probably also impaires low light sensitivity. The camcorder is not capable of playback. Playback is accomplished through the seperate playback unit. This is similar to the Kodak and Polaroid 8mm camcorders which must be placed in a playback cradle. Since the camcorder is incapable of playback I must assume it does not have an electronic view- finder. So it looks as if sony's 8mm camcorder is a basic stripped down version of the Kodak or JVC videomovie. Sony's original entry the Betamovie was also a stripped down record only Camcorder that used the Beta format 1/2" tape. I still prefer the JVC Videomovie which uses the VHS compatible 1/2" format tape. It is full featured with playback,rewind,fast- forward and memory and the ability to review a scene in the electronic viewfinder. However the JVC weighs 4 1/2 lbs. and is larger than Sony's 8mm entry. The market analysts seem to agree that Sony is banking on the 8mm market taking off even though they did not develope it. (matshushita did) Sony's share of the VCR market with their Beta format slipped to 9% in 1985 so they would be eager to drop it if 8mm catches on. By the way the paper quoted the list price of Sony's camcorder and playback unit at $1800 dollars.
keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) (06/07/85)
[............]
Speaking of Sony camera devices, whatever happened to the old (2 yrs or
so ago) rumors of a Sony disk camera recorder? It was supposed to allow
time-lapse and single frame by using a small magnetic disk and cost around
$600. I had heard it was available in Japan, but not in the U.S. yet.
Did it ever exist? I've been waiting for this one for 2 years.
Keith Doyle
# {ucbvax,ihnp4,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithdhsu@cvl.UUCP (Dave Hsu) (06/11/85)
> [............] > > Speaking of Sony camera devices, whatever happened to the old (2 yrs or > so ago) rumors of a Sony disk camera recorder? It was supposed to allow > time-lapse and single frame by using a small magnetic disk and cost around > $600. I had heard it was available in Japan, but not in the U.S. yet. > Did it ever exist? I've been waiting for this one for 2 years. > > Keith Doyle > # {ucbvax,ihnp4,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithd The Sony Mavica does not appear to have survived past the prototype stage. At least, it hasn't shown up around this corner of the world. I suspect a large part of the problem might have been making a high-enough quality printer which could be mass-produced. Of course, this problem is still being addressed by other manufacturers (see June Modern Photography, pg 56). -dave * The author has nothing to do with Sony, or any other manufacturers of anything, except for the obscure S2LS Field Modification GA 76-5b and c *