BEIJING (Web Desk) – The whopping $1,399 price tag for Casio’s latest gadget Exilim EX-TR70 is totally justified by its unbelievable selfie-friendly features.
Targeted mainly at Chinese women who are obsessed with taking photos of themselves and sharing them online, the camera is expected to earn the Japanese company a $403 million profit this year, the Oddity Central reports.
The new TR70 is a third generation Exilim, a line of unusually shaped cameras that are specifically made for selfies.
Right from the physical features to the UI, these cameras are streamlined to help the user click the perfect picture of their face every time.
‘Selfie Pad’
The hinged frame helps the device support itself, so it can easily be placed on any surface to face the subject.
It offers several ways to actually click a picture, including squeezing the body, using the ‘selfie pad’ on the side, using a countdown self-timer, placing the hand on a certain part of the frame to be detected by the camera, and by touching the 3” LCD.
The TR70 lens has an angle view equivalent to a 21mm or a 35mm system – excessively wide for a regular camera, but perfect when clicking pictures from an arm’s length distance. So users can easily get their friends into the frame, without having to resort to selfie-sticks.
The camera also uses an LED light instead of a flash, positioned closed to the lens axis to produce soft and shadow-less lighting. The round shape of the LED is designed to create an attractive circular sparkle, or catch-light, in the eyes.
‘Magical Weapon’
Nicknamed ‘zipai shenqi’ (which loosely translates to ‘magical weapon for ultimate selfies’), the TR70 truly is a ‘smart’ camera – its pose bracketing feature comes with a voice guidance system that counts down from three to give the user time to alter their stance between consecutive shots.
Five photographs are clicked per session this way, so users can easily figure out their best ‘angles’.
‘Super popular’
The Exilim cameras are wildly popular among women in China, so much so that in 2015, Casio recorded its highest profit in nine years. In fact, Chinese women in other parts of the world are scrambling to buy them too, although they’re currently only available in Asia.
“By the time I bought this camera in Shanghai, it was super popular,” Lin Shi, a Chinese student in New York, told Quartz.
“Whenever I went into a restaurant, I would see girls taking photos with these cameras.”
In China, Casio has three exclusive stores dedicated to selling the Exilim series. These shops resemble makeup boutiques, but instead of buying makeup, women can shop for cameras that make them look picture perfect.
