The Digital Harinezumi is a tiny camera, created by the creative minds at Powershovel/Superheadz in Japan (a music label, art book publishing company and more).
Released for the first time in 2009, the Harinezumi has become a cult item among photographers and artists, due to its peculiar qualities: basically it’s a point and shoot digital camera made to bring back the imperfections of some of the analog cameras many of us have grown up with (think of Polaroids, for example). Forget the coldness of your inexpensive digital camera, the Digital Harinezumi is all about saturated, dreamy colours.
The second version of the Digital Harinezumi came out last year, and recently has been updated with a Triple Plus model.
This model adds ten colour modes (maybe a slightly overwhelming choice, but some of these modes are very cool) to the already known features: colour, black and white, video mode, etc. The video feature is worth mentioning because it’s like having a pocket-sized Super 8, and the audio input quality is a welcome addition (which can be disabled).
Just talking of the connection between the Harinezumi and video artists all over the world, cities like New York, Paris and Tokyo have recently hosted Harinezumi no Mori (The Forest of Harinezumi). It’s a video installation (with more than 150 DVD players and video monitors) that “mutates and transforms as it moves around different cities all over the world, like a forest, it merges with foreign substances, roots deep in the earth, and in the end embraces everything”.
Unfortunately, it looks like the Triple Plus will also be the last model for this series. Due to the discontinuation of monitor screens, Digital Harinezumi series has been forced to shut down its production, so this could be your last chance to get your hands on this cool item before it’s too late.
Price: 150 euro (approx.)
Fab is a musician and Editor-in-Chief for AudioNewsRoom (ANR), a music technology online magazine.
