Digital cult cameras?

My vote would be for the following:

R-D1 (of course)
Sony DSC-F717 (great for IR and great lens)
Ricoh GRD

I don't own one but the Olympus E-1 seems to have a cult following as well.

Cheers - John
 
TXForester said:
electronics may last awhile, but try finding parts for a shutter in ten years.
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What would make a digital camera shutter less durable than a film camera shutter?

Also, don't forget that many cameras have only electronic shutter. It would be actually quite funny that the most durable camera could come out to be the ones which are completely electronic and not the DSLR...

Anyway, if shutter worries you just buy the S2, in addition to the focal plane shutter all lenses have their own shutter, plus is a very fine camera, plus it is Leica, plus it is going to be a cult for sure...

GLF
 
Many of the older cybershot fixed lens P&S have become rather cultish amongst camera trappers and deer hunters the past several years. They prefer certain models.
 
I think that we cannot use the same criteria for the film and digital cameras. It is silly to say that digital cameras cannot have a cult status only because they won't work in 30 years (why not 300 years or 2000 years compared to "real" cults) and they will not be passed onto next generation. Cult cameras for me are those which made significant break through and will be "alive" in a spoken word even when the last one will stop functioning.
For me Canon 5d, LX3, x100, r-d1 come to mind.
Alex
 
Leica Digital Modul R
Made in very small numbers, perhaps 2200, before a parting of the waves between Leica and Imacon. Image quality that belies its 2005 launch date. Still in regular use by its devotees (inc me!). Some small manufacturers providing bespoke battery rebuilds and off board power solutions. Still fetching strong money.

Charlie
www.charlie-chan.co.uk
 
I doubt it would be a cult camera, but my Canon Ion from the late 1980's (I wish I still had it) would be an interesting party conversation piece.
The Fuji S1 pro and the Canon D30 the latter I still have (Although it's dead) are candidates.
My vote though will go to one of the most popular cameras of all time–the iPhone which in 10 years will be considered a classic cult camera.
 
Kent said:
"Cult"-Cameras, digital or film, always have a particular position in camera history AND a special relation to their owners.

IMHO, those cams are likely to become cult-digicams:

- Canon EOS 5D (first affordable "fullframe" DSLR)
- Leica M9 (first "real" digital M)
- Leica Digilux 2 (legendary lens)
- Fuji X100 (took the digital RF idea onto a new level)
- Ricoh GRD series & Sigma DP1 (very "special" cameras, restricted versatility, but exactly that creates the "cult")


As for the Yashica EZ F521. I would love to see it becoming a cult cam, because I have one. ;)
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I need to add the Canon G2 and G3.
The Sony V1 could have been a cult too, but its short battery live annoyed many users.
 
There will likely never be a digital-equivalent to systems like Rollei 35 or a Canonet, an M3 or a XA, etc., to date and foreseeable future. Too many players, too many abused consumers, too much marketing hype and too little substance. I'm sure I missed a few too(s).

The cameras mentioned by others in this thread could be labelled as 'pivotal' or 'landmark' but not 'cult' to my mind. This is especially true if the conversation is about a single model. Frankly, I dislike the term 'cult', but probably could use 'adoration' if it had fewer syllables.

If the question asked for "series" or "systems" with fervent followers (competitors and "victims" may worm another 'f' or two in there somewhere), it may be plausible to answer but unlikely for any individual example.

To wit, there is a "fervent following" for the Canon G-series cameras; but being more specific with the G7 has diminishing merit.

Film is system agnostic, if we must carry the 'cult' tone, and independently has some modicum of passion associated with specific emulsions. Tri-X Pan is a 'classic' film that to this day has a strong, but increasingly depressed, following.

Kodacrhome, for more than the lyric, was a poster child for ardent supporters till digital gained its stride and a subsequently flailing Kodak drove a stake through it's sprockets.

Equally true is the nature of film-camera bodies and their flexibility on a format by format basis. In other words, outside of 120 VS 135, cameras had few concerns about emulsion. The minimum description was a "light-tight box that held film"; the pinhole as a prime example.

The virtually extinct Kodachrome user was not tied to a Canonet 1.7 QLIII and an original XA user was not bound to Ilford. The Kodak Disc, 620, 126 and APS users have not fared so well... much like XD and SM based cameras from earlir digital days.

Possibly the closest general analogue to our current environment might be the Polaroid SX70. Expensive to use, limited and quirky but also unique and generally reliable. To this day, shadows of this "landmark" system and its cult-like following are active, its practitioners are poorer by the shot.

Digital photography has blurred these lines and bonded the components. The qualities of design, ergonomics, electronics, available optics and manufacturing combine to encompass, often in singularity, what was once at least two components of the picture.

The most offensive of the analog between cameras, film and present day is consumability. It once was film but now replaced by the camera body or entire unit lens and all. The illusion of 'free', as so many people perceive, is a fallacy and is indeed, incrementally, the maintenance, reliability and depreciation. Don't conclude any more than the misperception as being the negative, but it does lead to some dysfunctional conversations.

In present day, the only currently manufactured, substantive, cult-like, cameras that I see are still film-based. The modern versions of the Diana, Holga and similar low-fidelity have more recognizable stamina than anything electronic.

Even these are more a 'trend' than a specific model. Even so, it is more akin to dogs and dog owners (some may see the colliery is deeper than the lines I draw), with the different breeds while they all follow a common canine origin. That is a Diana user will happily inspect a Holga's 'bling' (I was tempted to say tripod mount), or lack thereof.

With that I'll leave the last word to my border collie, he may have as strong a point as I:

Grr, woof, bark!
 
Jamie Pillers said:
I'm wondering if there will be any digital cameras that will be able to lay claim to the title "cult favorite" in the coming decades. It seems that digital innovations keep coming so frequently that it may be hard for any one camera to rise above the "What's new today?" noise. Maybe the Epson R-D1 and Leica M8? Leica Monochrome? Any others that you can think of?
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I don't think so. Not until/unless the manufacturers reach a plateau and can no longer design greater image quality into the sensors. I can't see someone using an M8 ten years from now, and feeling as if he's not making a compromise with every exposure, when a $500 Canon, at that time, will offer so much more. We're close to a point where the differences in a reasonable-sized print are either moot or so negligible that tech advances from 2012-on are going to be nearing meaninglessness, but we're not there yet. And the marketers and internet forums aren't nearly ready to allow us to believe we're there.

People said the Digilux would be a cult camera. I had a friend who thought he was acquiring "collectibles" in the form of digital cameras. I always laughed at that idea. If you see a guy on the street shooting an old Nikon F, any knowledgeable photographer will likely have a fair bit of respect for that guy. You see someone shooting a Nikon D1x, you're going to assume he can't afford to upgrade. Top of the line, and expensive at release... all moot 11 years later.

We have to face facts — consumers need to 'keep up' in the tech race for two reasons: confidence—that the gear will deliver the best results the photographer is capable of, and hopefully more; and insecurity that the guy next to him doesn't have an advantage. Those two 'consuming' rationales aren't soon going to disappear.
 
CK Dexter Haven said:
I don't think so. Not until/unless the manufacturers reach a plateau and can no longer design greater image quality into the sensors. I can't see someone using an M8 ten years from now, and feeling as if he's not making a compromise with every exposure, when a $500 Canon, at that time, will offer so much more. We're close to a point where the differences in a reasonable-sized print are either moot or so negligible that tech advances from 2012-on are going to be nearing meaninglessness, but we're not there yet. And the marketers and internet forums aren't nearly ready to allow us to believe we're there.

People said the Digilux would be a cult camera. I had a friend who thought he was acquiring "collectibles" in the form of digital cameras. I always laughed at that idea. If you see a guy on the street shooting an old Nikon F, any knowledgeable photographer will likely have a fair bit of respect for that guy. You see someone shooting a Nikon D1x, you're going to assume he can't afford to upgrade. Top of the line, and expensive at release... all moot 11 years later.

We have to face facts — consumers need to 'keep up' in the tech race for two reasons: confidence—that the gear will deliver the best results the photographer is capable of, and hopefully more; and insecurity that the guy next to him doesn't have an advantage. Those two 'consuming' rationales aren't soon going to disappear.
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I agree with your overall point. The digital factories continue to pump out gear that's better than the last, at least as measured by pixel numbers and performance. But I wonder if there have been a few little 'moments' along the way where a camera found a niche that it might continue to fill for years to come. The RD-1, X100, M8 (or 8.2), Ricoh GRDx, and maybe even the Nikon D7000?
 
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CK Dexter Haven said:
Not until/unless the manufacturers reach a plateau and can no longer design greater image quality into the sensors. I can't see someone using an M8 ten years from now, and feeling as if he's not making a compromise with every exposure, when a $500 Canon, at that time, will offer so much more. We're close to a point where the differences in a reasonable-sized print are either moot or so negligible that tech advances from 2012-on are going to be nearing meaninglessness, but we're not there yet. And the marketers and internet forums aren't nearly ready to allow us to believe we're there.
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Yes, few will want an M8 when an M9 is available. Some collectors will value its status as first digital M and some users will value it for its crop factor and high shutter speed, but most would likely pick the m9 if they had the opportunity to pick one or the other.

My list of digital cameras that deserve cult status includes a couple of one-of-a-kind machines that produce lovely results and offer something very unique:

- r-d1 : closest rf film experience on digital, not likely to change --unfortunately!

- Fuji x100: possibly to be superseded by a new model (not the XE, in my book) but for now a one of a kind camera, an Hexar AF for our decade, much more special because it's fixed 35 than the xp1, (again, IMHO).
 
I would have voted for Oly E-1 as well.
Has anyone mentioned the Pana Leica L1K? Interesting design despite being awkwardly big. I still love the camera for the small on-board bounce flash with the 25mm 1.4 AF summilux lens.
 
As a poster or two pointed out above I'd throw the Contax N Digital in there. In some ways crippled by poor firmware, lousy buffer and bad high ISO this full frame digital was the first one out there and had some magic at ISO 25. Combined with the Zeiss N lenses, particularly the spectacular 85/1.4, it could make some incredible images. Still has the largest pixel size of any digital SLR id I'm not mistaken.

Still going for 2 and 3K last time I checked.
 
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