Out with an (allegedly) 8MP digital camera: Digital Aerochromes and Street Art, 12 March 2024

Out with an (allegedly) 8MP digital camera: Digital Aerochromes and Street Art, 12 March 2024

The CEX website is usually an excellent resource for cheap digicams from the noughties and occasionally they have some real bargains so I'm always keeping an eye out. Just lately, though, instead of decent brands like older versions of Canon, Fuji, etc. they've been receiving more cheaper end, generic digicams like this Genius 8MP digital camera.

I'm not really familiar with Genius as a camera manufacturer, I've always associated the brand with cheap computer peripherals that you might pick up from high street stores like Dixons or Curry's. Unsurprisingly the quality and features of this camera, released apparently in 2009, are not that exceptional. It's a really just a basic point and shoot camera with the normal bells and whistles one would expect from a lower end digicam from the noughties. 

The boot-up screen of the camera is delightfully low resolution, though it switches on quite quickly. This is the fastest part of the camera though, as taking images is painful with save rates sometimes stretching into the seconds. It does have a limited manual mode, mind, with a maximum shutter speed of 8s. That was really useful when I took it out on its test run as the Infrared sensitivity was pretty good. 

As well as a couple of normal shots in colour and black and white modes, I took some images with colour and Infrared filters to make trichromes. On Auto mode the colour filtered black and white photos were fine, but it really struggled with taking an infrared image and I had to resort to manual mode and the 8s exposure. The trichromes and aerochromes came out quite nicely, though.

I took the camera with me when I went to Aveiro to take some Instax Wide images with my 1920s generic folding camera for the Frugal Film Project. I didn't have much time so I concentrated on some established street art and the wall of tags that I used for the FFP near the railway station. On the whole these were nice, but the camera was nothing special and I'm thinking this one might be ideal for a conversion to full spectrum for some #ShittyInfrared.

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