Digital Harinezumi

This was my first try with the Digital Harinezumi (or ‘Digi Hari’ or ‘Zumi’ as some people say). It is made by Superheadz who are the people behind several cameras including the popular Blackbird Fly.

From the site: “This tiny movie camera will inspire filmmakers from around the world, with its melancholic image quality. It also is the successor to the toy camera analog feel. The Digital Harinezumi is the camera that brings pleasure back to digital photography.”

It is a small and very light little digital camera, the picture quality is meant to be similar to that of an old film toy camera. As well as taking stills it also can capture video, the style of which is meant to be like old 8mm, the video has no audio.

When I first heard of this camera I was cynical, so many filters, apps, and Photoshop tutorials promise to get that ‘analog feel’ and yet rarely does it have that particular magic. However after seeing some of the results of the Digi Hari on Flickr, Vimeo, YouTube, and Photojojo I was very curious.

How the pictures compare to analog film cameras I will leave up to you to decide.

More information after the jump.

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Here are some thoughts on the camera should anyone want to know more:

Practicalities

Having used it for one day I can see that it has several practical advantages. It is so small and unlike a camera in appearance that it is possible to use it anywhere (e.g. inside shops). It is much less confrontational than a SLR (hey it even has a little hedgehog on the front) that it is much easier to take pictures on the street. It is much less intrusive, you could click away at family and social occasions without people feeling overly ‘photographed’.

Its physical size also makes it easy to carry and have out on your person, I wore it around my neck on a ribbon when we went out that night, I might experiment carrying it with me that way for a few days. I don’t think that anyone would try to mug me for it as I don’t think most people would think it had any value.

Taking pictures

The options are very simple, you can change the quality (low or high), the ISO (100 or 800), and switch between stills and video. It is possible to review the picture you have just taken but not to preview the picture. They say they have done this intentionally to simulate a characteristics of old toy cameras. There is a flip up rectangular piece that you can use as an approximate viewfinder, I remember this on my first camera when I was a kid, however I didn’t bother to use it in this instance as it was more fun just to click away.

Why not just use the iPhone?

I have an iPhone so why don’t I just use that with some of the analog style applications? Most importantly I don’t really want to be waving my iPhone around on the street. While I find the iPhone nice for sending pictures and video on Twitter and in messages it does feel inferior to my Canon rather than have any particular winning quality of its own.

Why not just use Photoshop?

There is a difference in taking a picture and then messing it up (adding light leaks and vignettes and so on) and taking a ‘messed up’ picture in the first place. This takes ‘messed up’ pictures in the first place – no extra work needed.

Conclusion

In conclusion I haven’t reached a conclusion yet – so far my thoughts are that it is a fun toy. There are none of those internal calculations that you perform with an SLR, it is taken out of your hands, you just have a go, click click click, and see what happens. I have only had one day with it so far, I am looking forward to trying it out further including testing out the video feature. Watch this space…