The Sony Mavica
August 1981 (prototype)
An electronic still camera that recorded TV-quality images on a small floppy disk. Not yet digital, but it announced the end of film to the industry.
How it began
In 1981 Sony showed a prototype camera that used no film: the Mavica, for magnetic video camera. It recorded up to 50 pictures on a small magnetic disk.
How it works
A CCD sensor produced a video signal that was written to the disk in analogue form, like a single frame of television. The pictures were viewed on a TV set.
Why it mattered
It shocked film companies, and Japanese electronics makers began the race to filmless cameras. Still video cameras went on sale later in the decade and were used by some newspapers.
Limits and what replaced it
Its resolution was only TV quality, and analogue recording could not be edited on computers. Digital cameras replaced it in the 1990s.
Today
The Mavica name was reused for Sony’s digital floppy-disk cameras of the late 1990s.