Digital Bolex Sidebar: Backing A Dream

Want a pick-up-and-take-to-the-beach camera? This isn’t it. So why back it?

Not because of the camera. The viewfinder is awful, there’s no usable video out and the ISO is a feeble 400. You’d be nuts to back this camera on its looks or its specs.

And that goofy, do-it-all handle—exposure settings, focus pulling, frame rate, hand-cranking, pencil sharpening—come on, pull the other one.

How about the the price tag of $2,500? Let’s get real. How much is a decent zoom lens? How much for a real eye-level viewfinder? Maybe the same $2,500 again, again and again.

“What I really want the D16 to be is a digital 16mm film camera,” says Joe. But, Joe, that’s impossible. A digital version of a 1950s film camera. Is he serious? I think so. He’s a dreamer, and that’s the whole point.

The world needs dreamers—quit your office job and become a winemaker, sail around the world, write the next movie, design a car that runs on water...

I’m backing the couple and their dream, not the camera.

Here take my money, have fun, make magic...