Attention Instagrammers everywhere: Camera Restricta – a new open source app with an accompanying 3D printed camera – calls itself a "disobedient tool for taking unique photographs."
Targeted at tourists and travelers, the device contains a GPS that searches for geotagged photos in the nearby area, letting you know how many pictures have been taken of a specific site. If there are too many photos that have already been taken (within a range of 35 x 35 meters, or 115 x 115 feet), the camera retracts the shutter and blocks the viewfinder to prevent you from taking another generic picture. The camera also houses your smartphone, speakers and an antenna.
The app itself synthesizes the camera sound in real-time using the Web Audio API. If the number is above a certain threshold, a photo cell place in front of the screen transmits the signal to a micro-controller, which then retracts the shutter.
Even the name of the product is a tribute to the first ever photographic camera: the Camera Obscura.
"It is a speculation on a possible new generation of cameras where the once obedient tool becomes an authority," says founder and multidisciplinary designer Philipp Schmitt.
Schmitt explains that his device can be controversial because it prevents people from contributing to "the overflow of generic digital imagery." He suggests that the government could also use the technology to police tourists from taking photographs in certain areas.
It's not so much the technology that's interesting, but rather its orientation. Schmitt sees his camera as not only a political tool (albeit a fairly problematic one) but also one that rearranges our understanding of the practice of photography. That's big talk for a 3D printed camera — it remains to be seen if this one will have any impact, or if it will just feed the ever-growing wanderlust of hipsters everywhere.
