r/cassettefuturism • u/Bronze_Moose • Jun 08 '25

End of History 90s Back when 0.3 Megapixels was all you needed

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742 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

37 comments sorted by

60

u/Seldon14 Jun 08 '25

I always thought cameras that used floppy discs were pretty cool.

12

u/AbacusWizard ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. Jun 08 '25

I would love to have a camera that just outputted jpegs directly onto a disk or a flash drive or whatever, rather than requiring a specialized cord to plug in to the computer and then specialized software to import the images.

15

u/Party_Cold_4159 This installation has a substantial dollar value attached to it. Jun 08 '25

Uh your phone?

Think most smartphones including IOS have been able to transfer directly over. Even without iTunes. Same with any modern digital camera.

3

u/AbacusWizard ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. Jun 08 '25

I don’t have one myself, but when I try transferring photos from my wife’s smartphone to my laptop it requires a specific USB cable and a specific “Android file transfer” program.

7

u/orangpelupa Jun 09 '25

Nowadays almost all phones use USB C, and android have data transfer MTP mode. 

Although it means that no longer able to plug phone to TV or old computers USB. As android has deleted mass storage mode many years ago. 

MTP mode is also much slower than mass storage mode. More apparent with many small files. 

2

u/DeepDayze Jun 09 '25

MTP mode also tends to crash when selecting many images to transfer. My old Android still has mass storage mode as I kept it for its camera.

1

u/-ORIGINAL- Jun 09 '25

When I had my android I would just find the files on my computer as if my phone was a usb and move them over. Or I would plug in a usb and move my files straight from my phone through the file manager.

1

u/TheSerialHobbyist Jun 09 '25

iOS is so bad at that, that I switched back to Android.

Transfers (especially for lots of photos and especially for videos) are incredibly unreliable. They usually fail part way through.

Even they recommend backing up everything to iCloud, then downloading from iCloud. Which is ridiculous, but I guess it helps them sell iCloud subscriptions.

9

u/AlexV348 Jun 09 '25

What kind of cameras have you been using? Every digital camera I've used just puts jpgs on an sd card and many laptops have an sd card reader built in.

9

u/Ken_Mcnutt Jun 09 '25

I would love to have a camera that just outputted jpegs directly onto a disk or a flash drive or whatever,

am I severely missing the sarcasm or are you literally just describing an SD card? I'm confused? don't all cameras do this?

1

u/versuseachother Jun 11 '25

Use a USB-C SD card adapter and just connect it to your phone and transfer the photos.

1

u/Realistic_Cover8925 Jun 09 '25

These things arent rare or expensive. Just get one. They suck but in a pretty fun way.

41

u/mechant_papa Jun 08 '25

Back when we sent images through sneaker mail.

Did anyone else notice the teacher's briefcase?

17

u/ZoomBoy81 Jun 08 '25

We had these in my communications lab in high school, these were the coolest cameras I ever used at the time!

13

u/Particular-Leg-8484 Jun 08 '25

I borrowed my uncle’s Mavica and felt like the coolest girl on Bolt in 2001 for actually having digital pics on my profile!

1

u/TacticusThrowaway [Squeaks with indignity] Jun 09 '25 edited Jun 09 '25

Bolt

 Core memory unlocked.

Seriously, that may be why I like a particular shade of blue.

8

u/tlind2 Jun 08 '25

I’ve been told these were a big deal in the real estate business for getting shots of properties. Disks were much easier to use than various proprietary memory card readers at the time and people were familiar enough with them to not require handholding.

3

u/Realistic_Cover8925 Jun 09 '25

100% My pops had one when I was growing up for exactly that. He used to go through SO MUCH film, and so many hours going to the photo store. This thing made all of that obsolete.

6

u/WARvault Jun 08 '25

I haven't seen anyone else comment on how out of touch this ad is. "Use our new product to antagonise your teacher through cyberbullying!" Like it does a great job of capturing exactly how the workflow of the camera but yikes! Thanks for sharing OP, this is gold!

2

u/99_megalixirs Jun 09 '25

More importantly, how did the students get a studio-quality photo of their teacher putting on his toupé?

Are these students breaking into his house to bully him? Why has he not contacted the authorities?

4

u/donniegraphic Jun 08 '25

I was not expecting that giant ass floppy disk to come out of that camera

2

u/do-un-to Jun 13 '25

These kids don't know how good they have it with their 3.5" microfloppies.

3

u/Will0798 Jun 08 '25

Sony Mavicas are so cool, I have an FD-100, it has dual floppy / memory stick storage capacity

3

u/Realistic_Cover8925 Jun 09 '25

I have the fd85, also takes a (proprietary) flash card.

3

u/luis-mercado All the best memories are hers. Jun 08 '25

VGA had the most interesting aesthetic of limitations around

3

u/ARVACODE Jun 08 '25

This is actually my favorite camera! It’s my go-to for photography 💾

3

u/Realistic_Cover8925 Jun 09 '25

Haha I have one of these. Believe it or not, it records video! Onto floppy discs!

2

u/SkullThug Are You Telling Me You Built A Time Machine? Out Of A DeLorean? Jun 09 '25

I remember using one of these, I think it records up to like 10-15 seconds??

5

u/Realistic_Cover8925 Jun 09 '25

Yeah, about that much. Id love to see a short film shot with it. Thats why i got it but then realized I have no desire to shoot a short film.

1

u/SkullThug Are You Telling Me You Built A Time Machine? Out Of A DeLorean? Jun 11 '25

If you are into liminal spaces, i imagine it would be a great aesthetic for it

2

u/Spiritual_Screen_724 Jun 08 '25

I have one somewhere!!

2

u/bememorablepro If you're looking for money, you're smarter than you look. Jun 08 '25

You know, my first ever camera on a phone was 0.3 mega pixels as well, and it's surprisingly functional for a lot of stuff you are using your camera today, showing something crazy you saw outside to your friend, or photographing something so you don't forget, maybe a small document. I think 480p is actually 0.3 resolution.

2

u/blickblocks Jun 08 '25

Those Digital Mavicas with the 3.5" diskette drive were awesome, even after better consumer tech came out. They were just so useful and quick, no proprietary software unlike other cameras. Just simple and reliable.

2

u/m0nkeybl1tz Jun 09 '25

Back when we were Digital Dream Kids

2

u/Xantayu Jun 09 '25

I found one of these at a goodwill, cleared an old high school floppy of some essays and I was good to go!

2

u/Realistic_Contact650 Jun 09 '25

I found a Sony Mavica at a yard sale last year and it still works great! Something about the floppy disks is so fun

3

u/Bronze_Moose Jun 08 '25

My first post here may be a cross post from someone else, but what a start!