The 1988 VIDEO Floppy Disk Camera: Canon Xap Shot RC-250 on HackerTube: recommended by 1 Hacker News commenter across 1 month, 2018–2025.
explainer · evergreen
LGR looks at the 1988 Canon Xap Shot, a still video camera that records photos to a floppy disk as analog NTSC signal rather than digital data.
HN shares it as a fun explanation of analog floppy-disk cameras.
“A fun video to learn more about the tech”
3 Hacker News comments link this video. Each one links back to its thread.
Yes, probably -- before digital cameras, there were still video cameras. They used a CCD to record still video images onto magnetic media such as a video floppy disk. So a lot like a digital camera, but fully analog. These were pretty cutting-edge tech in the mid 80's and would have made a lot of sense for a project like this. [link] [link] A fun video to learn more about the tech: ▶ this video
in “Street View of 1980s New York” · View on HN
It's interesting that you differentiate between analog and digital electronic cameras. My first "digital" camera was one of the Canon Ion ones that use floppy discs but actually record the photos in analog, so technically just an "electronic camera", but was marketed as a "Still Video Camera" (!). You had to use a video capture card to get the images into the PC. [link] ▶ this video
in “A 'toaster with a lens': The story behind the first handheld digital camera” · View on HN
Similarly, there have been photo cameras that used floppies for image storage, and I'm not talking about sony's Cybershoot cameras which stored photos as actual files - I'm talking cameras which just stored photos as analog signal directly on the floppy, in NTSC format! ▶ this video
in “A floppy-disk Walkman using a Raspberry Pi” · View on HN