Greetings and welcome to an LGR camera thing!
And this delightful example is the Canon RC-250 XapShot, released at $800 US dollars in December
of 1988, as well as being launched as the RC-251 Ion in Europe and the RC-250 Q-Pic in Japan.
And this is what was known as a “Still Video Camera.”
Which means that the RC-250 takes photos by capturing a video feed and storing them as
a still, freeze-frame image for displaying like a photograph.
And to do this it uses these 2” Video Floppy, or VF, disks.
Originally called Mavipaks when developed by Sony
they were built for use with early Sony Mavica cameras.
Several manufacturers later took advantage of the format, including Canon here, through
the mid-80s and into the early 90s as a sort of stop-gap between analog film cameras and
fully-digital cameras.
So yeah, this is not a digital camera, even though it packs a CCD and uses floppy disks
which would normally store data in a digital fashion.
Instead it records single frames of NTSC or PAL video onto each of the disk’s 50 tracks,
with the ability to record 50 images on cameras like the RC-250 that support Hi-VF
or High Band Video Floppy disks.
And each track on-disk allows for writing, erasing, and rewriting through the camera
itself on the fly, quite fantastic in the years of film.
That’s what I mean about this being a kind of stop-gap between film and digital, it’s
just a fascinating thing technically-speaking, and the fact that it uses such a tiny floppy
disk pleases my very soul.
As for the RC-250 itself, it was quite a popular model back in the day, at least as far as
still video cameras were concerned.
The press were certainly impressed, with the RC-250 being one of the first filmless electronic
cameras to hit the market at a reasonable price.
By comparison, Canon’s RC-701 video floppy disk camera from 1986
started at $2,600, limiting its appeal quite a bit.
So just in time for the 100th anniversary of the original Kodak Box Camera, Canon released
the RC-250 at under a thousand dollars, leading Popular Mechanics to say "in a century or
so, it might share the Kodak's status as the first of its kind
to make an esoteric technology available to millions."
Heh, yeah maybe.
I also love how some magazines described the shape of the XapShot, such as PC Magazine
describing it as “about the size of a well-packed sandwich.”
Depending on the sandwich, I’d say that’s spot-on.
Before we get to trying out the XapShot, let’s take a gander at what you got in the box back in ‘88.
Despite it being a bit beat up, the contents were still complete and in lovely condition
inside, so I was quite happy to have won this on eBay a while ago.
Inside the box you get two smaller boxes, the first one containing the camera itself
tucked into a fitted styrofoam tray, alongside a drawstring carrying bag, all of which I’ve
seen have begun to deteriorate.
Inside the second box you get the usual assortment of end-user paperwork, as well as a neatly
put together manual that succinctly describes and illustrates the various functions and
accessories for the RC-250.
Gotta love those sharp illustrations, mm.
Then you get another tray filled with accessories, like the wall power adapter/charging unit
and a tightly-packaged rechargeable battery that has undoubtedly lost its mojo.
Lastly are the various cables and adapters for charging and plugging the camera into
a playback device, more on that soon.
As for the sandwich-sized camera itself, I think it’s quite a pleasing design, with
its soft rounded corners and chunky disk drive eject mechanism.
[shunk!]
[slide, click]
Ahh, that feels sublime.
Along the front of the camera you get a flash, the eject button, a window for the viewfinder
to find views, an LED indicator for timing pictures, and this nifty amalgam of circular doodads.
On the left is the exposure metering window,
on bottom is a white balance sensor, and on top is the lens itself.
The lens is of the 11 millimeter fixed focus variety with an f-stop of 2.8.
And yep, that means you have a pretty low field of view, being the equivalent
of a 60 mil lens on a 35 millimeter camera.
While its shooting range is 1 meter to infinity, it also boasts a macro mode switch on top
here that allows for shooting as close as 30 centimeters, or about 1 foot.
On top you get a two-step shutter button, a sliding switch for flash options, another
slider for powering it on and changing modes, some reverse and forward feed buttons for
switching disk tracks, a shooting mode selector, a +1.5 step exposure compensator, and an LCD
panel for displaying LCDs on a panel.
And around back you get a wrist wrap, the viewfinder surrounded by a dioptric focus
ring for crappy eyes like mine, and a connection for video output.
Yep, in order to view the photos you have to hook this thing up to a display through
composite or RF, either directly through this cable or by routing through the power adapter.
And finally there’s a spot for a 200 milliamp hour lead storage battery, of which I’ve
never run across one that still holds a charge.
Thankfully it came with that wall adapter so I’m not completely outta luck, though
I had to haul this portable battery pack around while taking photos so that’s fun.
A further annoyance is the lack of a lens cap, and as far as I know this never came with one.
Sucks since I kept accidentally touching the lens whenever I pulled it out to use it, so
it could really use one, but oh well.
Taking a pic is straightforward stuff: just switch into the record mode, letting it count
down to the first available track on the disk.
[disk drive whirs to life, followed by a low clicking noise of the stepper motor]
After that, press the shutter button and it’ll take a picture.
[drive powers up] [shutter clicks]
I just love every sound this thing makes, from the disk loading to the shutter.
Sounds even cooler in the surprisingly quick continuous shooting mode too!
[rapid shutter noises]
It’ll then move to the next available track on the disk, displaying the current one you’re
about to record to on the LCD.
And if you want to erase a photo, just move the main switch to erase, use the reverse
and forward buttons to choose the track you don’t want,
hold down the mode button, and press the shutter. Aw yeah.
You’re now ready to view your photos on a TV!
Er.
Well, if it still worked anyway.
So the XapShot, and Video Floppy Disk cameras in general, have become a bit of an obsession
for me over the past year, largely because finding functional hardware is a challenge.
The first one I got was this Sony MVC-C1, also from 1988.
It uses the same 50-track VF disks and is a truly sexy piece of hardware in my view
so I was psyched to review it.
But of course it wasn’t working, it wouldn’t even read a disk, and all attempts at repair were in vain.
Then I got a good deal on this complete in box RC-250 XapShot, which the seller said
was unused and hopefully that meant it was in fully-working order.
But of course not, that would be too easy!
Turns out everything functioned *except* the ability to actually view your photos
which is the entire point.
So I grabbed another supposedly-working RC-250, with yet another bundle of accessories and
a claim from the seller that it was fully functional.
But once again it had plenty of issues, even more than the last one.
Not only would it refuse to take photos, but playing back exposed disks wasn’t happening,
just got nothing but static.
Finally I decided to skip the whole idea of playing disks through the camera itself and
sought out one of these professional video floppy disk recorders.
Say hello to the Sony MVR-5300 Hi-VF Still Video Recorder
which sold for over $4,000 US dollars in 1994.
While Canon, Sony, and others did indeed sell video floppy players for the home, units like
this one were never marketed at retail, instead being sold largely through medical, scientific,
and industrial suppliers for use with professional imaging devices.
But since it uses the same video disks and I got a decent deal, I figured why not give it a shot!
Anyway, after spending an irksome quantity of time and money I finally had success!
And just like the camera itself, operating the MVR-5300 is a pleasure, with its slot-loading
disk drive and glowing orange LEDs.
This machine can do a lot, but for now I’m just gonna use it for scrolling through these
photos I took with the Canon.
You can go through each of them individually at your own pace, or you can use this interval
wheel and the autoplay mode to go through them like a slideshow.
And that was really how these still video cameras were sold to consumers for a time:
basically a fancy slide projector, without the slides or the projector.
On top of this, several video printers were released throughout the ‘90s to create hard
copies, albeit not very cheaply, and there were even early computer capture devices that
allowed for digitizing analog video, an even more costly proposition.
But in the late ‘80s the main idea behind still video cameras was just plugging it into
a TV and viewing them that way.
And as you can see it really is like looking at paused frames of video, complete with wobbly
imagery and strange artifacting.
Though I have a feeling much of that is due to the hardware having degraded
now that multiple decades have passed.
In a way it’s kind of awesome though, I mean, check out this old disk that one of
my cameras came with.
Not only is it filled with some authentic retro pics taken by a previous owner, but
its particular style of analog distortion and noise is a vaporwave wet dream.
Not to mention a prime candidate for some cursed image material.
And the more I recorded, erased, and re-recorded to this disk, the more the resulting imagery
became increasingly corrupt, much like what you’d get by doing the same with a VHS tape.
I still had similar results with new old stock video disks, so unfortunately this means that
I can’t show photos as cleanly as I’d prefer.
Hopefully this is still decent enough to get across the idea of what photos taken with
the RC-250 look like.
As usual with older cameras I like taking photos of older things, and the XapShot produces
some fantastically retro imagery.
Again, it’s like a hybrid of what I’d expect from both vintage film and vintage
digital, a pleasing mix of analog and electronic.
And with its high band specification, it was supposed to be able to capture 500 vertical
lines of video resolution, but in practice it ended up being fewer than 400 from what I’ve read.
Still, the images are clearer than I imagined they’d be, and the color reproduction is
vibrant without being overblown.
And for the most part it handles all sorts of lighting situations quite happily, with
it tending to skew more towards underexposing rather than going over
even with compensation enabled.
It also does an admirable job in terms of color reproduction, UV filtering, and dynamic
range, just compare this shot of the same scene taken on my phone’s camera.
Obviously the resolution and analog capture device aren’t doing this any favors, but still.
Heh, and as an example of how zoomed in every shot is
with the RC-250, here’s the uncropped smartphone shot.
Yeah due to that 11 millimeter lens you have to stand a good ten or so feet farther away
from subjects than you might think.
But as someone who often shoots with a 50 millimeter prime lens I don’t mind at all,
and in fact, I love the results I get with this RC-250.
And I do mean this one in particular, because again, it’s kinda screwed up and I’ve
never once gotten a completely uncorrupt photo from it.
And that’s okay!
When it comes to retro photography, I don’t often reach for a camera that’s going to
provide crispy, hi-res reproductions of reality.
If I wanna do that I use a DSLR or my phone.
But if I’m gonna go retro, I often go for something that uses obsolete media or something
a little bit fallible that produces unpredictable results.
And the Canon RC-250 XapShot with its 2” Hi-VF disks fits that job perfectly for me.
If you enjoyed this episode of LGR, perhaps you’d care to take a look at some of the
other retro camera videos I’ve made!
Or any of the other old and odd technological thingies that I cover here every week.
As always though, thank you very much for watching!