Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

[yoshi]

From the bottom of a carton box I haven't opened for more than 6 years, I found two pieces of 8MB smartmedia card today. One taken in Jan 1998 and another, in Sept 2000. - taken by then "a most advanced compact digicam" IMHO. - Everything was automatic. No manual control whatsoever. It says " 1.4 Million Pixels, Progressive CCD (I guess a Kodak), 3x zoom


I was really glad to find these as I believed until today that I lost the media cards and accidentally erased all files from my old computer when transferring to a new.
Digital media cards looks like surely better than films in keeping photos for longer time.

The first one: Lunar New Year in Jan 1998 - the month I started to live there.



The second: Hair Dressors taken in Sept 2000
I had taken the kid pictures several times in the previous months and given his mother hard copies on the following weekends. And on this day the mother (on the left) finally allowed me to take her pictures.

[Pops]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

What a great find Yoshi.
Both colour and clarity have not only been retained but appear to exceed the quality of many of todays photographs.

[Pol]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Lucky find!

It's interesting to note how good the picture quality is. The skin tones are excellent on the second picture. very good colour tones and definition throughout.

I had a cheap old digital camera in 1997. It was a special offer free gift (Agfa) that came with a new computer. The pictures were ok but not as good as yours. I think it was about 640px or thereabouts, no media card just built in memory. It ran off 4 AA batteries which didn't last long and it stored 20 picture files. I didn't use it much. I preferred to stick with my trusty Sureshot70.

The Agfa may still be lying around somewhere but I don't think I particularly want to find it again.

Pol

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Pops and Pol, many thanks for the comments. Yes, what made me glad is that the picture quality seems to be keeping the original ones, although the posted ones were slightly tweaked (contrast & sharpness) and resized.

I looked into a excel file and found that I paid more than 70K yen for 10 pieces of 8-Mega bite-smartmedia. So Yen 880/Mega in 1997. After 3.5 years, I added three 32MB smartmedia cards which I paid about 7K yen for. That is Yen 74.8/MB.
During the 3.5 years, the price declined to less than 1/10 th in 2001. - Today, in 2007, a 4GB CF card sells at, for example, for yen 11500. So 2.8 yen/MB. In ten years, the price per MB declined to only 3%.

It was an unintended durability test of the media cards but after reading your comments, I calculated this looking back the 10 year history of digicams.
yoshi

[Ian]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Pops and Pol, many thanks for the comments. Yes, what made me glad is that the picture quality seems to be keeping the original ones, although the posted ones were slightly tweaked (contrast & sharpness) and resized.

I looked into a excel file and found that I paid more than 70K yen for 10 pieces of 8-Mega bite-smartmedia. So Yen 880/Mega in 1997. After 3.5 years, I added three 32MB smartmedia cards which I paid about 7K yen for. That is Yen 74.8/MB.
During the 3.5 years, the price declined to less than 1/10 th in 2001. - Today, in 2007, a 4GB CF card sells at, for example, for yen 11500. So 2.8 yen/MB. In ten years, the price per MB declined to only 3%.

It was an unintended durability test of the media cards but after reading your comments, I calculated this looking back the 10 year history of digicams.
yoshi

Hi Yoshi - as usual, a fascinating read thanks to you

I have some old SmartMedia cards too - one is even the old 5V type, which I don't think many card readers can actually support.

I'm interested in your trip to Hanoi (Vietnam, I presume?) Did you say you were living there? Did your job take you there?

Ian

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Ian,
yes, I lived in Hanoi for three years. In the preceding two years, I visited there on long business trip basis say altogether for four months or so a year and after repeating this for two years, I finally lived there. So in my memory I feel as if I had spent there for five years.

Before living there, I asked my Vietnamese colleague about reversal film development in Vietnam and he said no problem for negas but did not recommend reversal films at that time. So I bought a digital camera together with a printer. If I choose the highest quality images, then one 8MG card was only enough for 4 shots. So I bought ten to make it near a 135 film shots.
But I soon learned no problem at all for reversals as well. Both for 135 and medium format films. A photogenic country!

yoshi

[Ian]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Ian,
yes, I lived in Hanoi for three years. In the preceding two years, I visited there on long business trip basis say altogether for four months or so a year and after repeating this for two years, I finally lived there. So in my memory I feel as if I had spent there for five years.

Before living there, I asked my Vietnamese colleague about reversal film development in Vietnam and he said no problem for negas but did not recommend reversal films at that time. So I bought a digital camera together with a printer. If I choose the highest quality images, then one 8MG card was only enough for 4 shots. So I bought ten to make it near a 135 film shots.
But I soon learned no problem at all for reversals as well. Both for 135 and medium format films. A photogenic country!

yoshi

Hi Yoshi - can you share with us what model of camera you were using back then? I would like to guess - maybe an early Olympus or Fujfilm model? I'm guessing Olympus C-2000Z - but maybe it came out slightly later than 1998?

Ian

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Yoshi - can you share with us what model of camera you were using back then? I would like to guess - maybe an early Olympus or Fujfilm model? I'm guessing Olympus C-2000Z - but maybe it came out slightly later than 1998?

Ian

Hi Ian, this is it! Oly C-1400L.
yoshi

[Ian]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hi Ian, this is it! Oly C-1400L.
yoshi

Of course and sorry for forgetting that you originally said 1.4MP (I had 2MP stuck in my head!).

The C-1400L was a remarkable camera for its time, and the first that I ever used that didn't produce images that looked like video stills .

Hanoi in 1998 must have been quite a contrast to Japan?

Ian

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Hanoi in 1998 must have been quite a contrast to Japan?
Ian

Yes, of course. People were/are friendlier, kindlier and foods are just delicious!
yoshi

[Ian]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Yes, of course. People were/are friendlier, kindlier and foods are just delicious!
yoshi

Mmmm - Vietnamese food; very hot and spicy?

We have many Thai restaurants here, but not so many Vietnamese.

Ian

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

Mmmm - Vietnamese food; very hot and spicy?

We have many Thai restaurants here, but not so many Vietnamese.

Ian

[StuartR]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

From the bottom of a carton box I haven't opened for more than 6 years, I found two pieces of 8MB smartmedia card today. One taken in Jan 1998 and another, in Sept 2000. - taken by then "a most advanced compact digicam" IMHO. - Everything was automatic. No manual control whatsoever. It says " 1.4 Million Pixels, Progressive CCD (I guess a Kodak), 3x zoom

I was really glad to find these as I believed until today that I lost the media cards and accidentally erased all files from my old computer when transferring to a new.
Digital media cards looks like surely better than films in keeping photos for longer time.

That was a lucky find Yoshi! I hope I have the same luck and find a copy of some 500 photos that I lost in a computer move a couple of years back. I was sure I'd backed them up but despite looking at old hard disks, CDs and ZIP drives, I've never found them. They were all taken with my first digital camera - a Kodak DC210.

The pictures from the DC210 were OK-ish but I think my second digital camera, a 2MP Olympus 2020Z, took pictures that, like yours in this thread, still look good by today's standards.

I gave my 2020Z to my sister and she made good use of it before moving up to a Canon 350D like me. My sister passed it to a brother who used it for a while before accepting my redundant Minolta Dimage 7 and he passed it on to another brother (I come from a big family ) who is still using it to good effect today. I reckon I bought it in 2000 so I think we've got good value from it! (and I still have another sister & brother to go )

[Ian]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

That was a lucky find Yoshi! I hope I have the same luck and find a copy of some 500 photos that I lost in a computer move a couple of years back. I was sure I'd backed them up but despite looking at old hard disks, CDs and ZIP drives, I've never found them. They were all taken with my first digital camera - a Kodak DC210.

The pictures from the DC210 were OK-ish but I think my second digital camera, a 2MP Olympus 2020Z, took pictures that, like yours in this thread, still look good by today's standards.

I gave my 2020Z to my sister and she made good use of it before moving up to a Canon 350D like me. My sister passed it to a brother who used it for a while before accepting my redundant Minolta Dimage 7 and he passed it on to another brother (I come from a big family ) who is still using it to good effect today. I reckon I bought it in 2000 so I think we've got good value from it! (and I still have another sister & brother to go )

Sadly, I did lose a chunk of images that were not back-up several years ago. It was the Love Bug virus

That reminds me - I need to do some backups today!

Ian

[yoshi]

Re: Hanoi, 1998 & 2000

I gave my 2020Z to my sister and she made good use of it before moving up to a Canon 350D like me. My sister passed it to a brother who used it for a while before accepting my redundant Minolta Dimage 7 and he passed it on to another brother (I come from a big family ) who is still using it to good effect today. I reckon I bought it in 2000 so I think we've got good value from it! (and I still have another sister & brother to go )

Hi Stuart,
yeah... although you were unlucky in loosing the 500 shots but apparently the C2020C is a very lucky camera, as it is still being used by one of your relatives. I sometimes think I should use a camera as long as I can use it. but not easy as you know.

yoshi