Olympus History

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• History of Cameras
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  • the Semi-Olympus I - the Pen Series
  • the Olympus OM-1 - the XA Series

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The XA was the first camera to win a Good Design Award, thanks to the appeal of its capless design.

The key concept of Sony's Walkman audio system was to enjoy music outdoors, in contrast with the perception of music as something to be enjoyed indoors. It first appeared on the market around the same time as the XA. The concept was also similar. Both products were designed to be taken everywhere, one to provide audio, the other to record images. The XA became the first camera to win a Good Design Grand Prize. As you may know, the Good Design Grand Awards are sponsored by the Japan Industrial Design Promotion Organization. There are tens of thousands of applications every year, from which around one thousand products are selected for Good Design Awards. Awards have been given for large items, such as buildings and vehicles, and for small items, ranging from fountain pens to household products. The best of these receive prestigious Good Design Grand Prizes, and the XA was the first camera to earn this distinction. The path to this achievement was a difficult one in many ways. There were many problems at the planning stage, and at the manufacturing stage. One of those problems related to the use of plastic. There was intense interest in plastic at that time, but if you made a product from plastic it looked cheap. I am an engineer, but I also know a little about design, and I wanted to use plastic in a way that exploited the characteristics of the material without making the camera look cheap. So we used plastic for the cover that replaced the cap.

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