James's Camera Collection: Vivitar PN2011
Vivitar PN2011 Japan 35mm cameras
Vivitar PN2011
Camera type: Rangefinder
Approx. dates of manufacture: 1990s
Approx. street value: almost none

Normally I don't get these little plastic point-n-shoots even if they're giving them away. I got this guy because inside the case for it there was this neat little folding table-top tripod. It wouldn't be any good for a heavy camera, but for a small digital like my Canon S100, it would be great.

This is a pseudo-panoramic camera. Whereas a real panoramic camera has some sort of mechanism to let the lens cover a wider-than-normal swath of film, this one simply allows you to mask off 1/3rd of the image area (the top and bottom thirds) so that the image has a wider aspect ratio. It's not physically any wider than a normal 35mm camera produces, it's just masked. You can do the same thing in a darkroom with any enlarger, or at home with a scanner and Photoshop. Whoop-de-do.

But if you're bored one day and you want to see something interesting, do a Google search on this camera and see all the hits you get. This was an oddly popular camera.

 

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