A year after introducing the DC40, Kodak brought this look-alike onto the market. Looks can be deceiving – even though the DC50 is also a ‘binocular-style’ camera, its origins were different from those of its predecessor. The story is that Kodak’s manufacturing partner, Chinon of Japan, developed and sold a camera named the ES 300 with good success. Kodak negotiated to improve some of the technical specifications and design features of this camera, and put it on the market with its own badge. Thus the Kodak DC50 was born.
It has nice features including external storage (PCMCIA card), a 3x zoom lens, faster shutter speed (1/500 sec), exposure compensation, selectable spot focusing and an improved 0.4 megapixel colour sensor. Kodak made the user interface simple (and even cartoon-like) as the image from the manual shows.
What a busy year for Kodak’s digital development team.
They brought out the DC210 Zoom, the DC25, the DC50 Zoom and this one.
The manufacturing team wasn’t quite so busy, though. They arranged for Chinon to make this camera for them. In return, Chinon got the exclusive marketing rights for Japan where it sold the camera as the Chinon ES-1000.
The DC20 is about as simple a digital point-and-shoot camera as could be. There is no monitor screen or even an LCD status display. There are three little LEDs to advise the photographer of the status of the camera. There are just two buttons – one to turn the camera on/off and one to delete all images. There is no built-in flash, although Kodak sold a flash attachment for extra money.
This example of the DC20 outfit is very special. The original owner was a member of the Kodak educational team that introduced digital imaging to Australia in the 1990s. For this reason, the camera is accompanied by an original Kodak Press Kit and a digital photography demonstration CD.
David Leith © 2023