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Comment by 2III7 | Hacker News Reader

Electric cars/bicycles/scooters/motorcycles, computers in everyones pocket, huge cheap TV-s, fast wireless internet, robotic lawn mowers, radar cruise control and the list goes on and on and on...

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Drones that have a 30+ minute battery life. 4k cameras. Rockets that land themselves.

Are 4k cameras actually that much better than film from the 80s? (other than convenience)

depends what you mean by convenience. The image quality of a 4k camera isn't that much better, but that's largely because it doesn't need to be. Cameras in the 80s already produced great pictures. The difference is that they can weigh less than a pound and be run for hours at a time without worrying about paying ridiculous amounts for film.

Hmmm, a 4K camera that can fly around for 30+ minutes with a controller attached to your cell phone (which in and of itself would blow the mind of any person in the 80s) that has the visual clarity of an image shot on 35mm motion picture camera weighing in at 70+lbs that could only be used aerially by renting a professionally piloted plane/helicopter at more $$ per hour rental than the drone you fly on your own costs?

No, I can't imagine any benifits for modern tech from the 80s ;-)

well, high quality digital is a whole different game from film. in the 1980's the closest thing was a VHS camcorder and my 4k micro four thirds digital camera absolutely blows a 1980's VHS camcorder out of the water.

Yes the image quality of a 4K camera is technically less than that of a film video camera, but show a 1980's movie producer a digital workflow and their mind would be blown. You shoot the picture and can then immediately review and even edit.

So 4K video beats home VHS on quality by leaps and bounds, and for anyone who would have been producing video on film the workflow for digital is amazing.

Drones, for sure. Only a few years ago, a decent digital camera cost $400. Now I can buy one just as good, for the same price, that fucking flies.

Anyone who doesn't experience a genuine "Holy shit, I'm actually living in the future" moment when they first encounter a Mavic Mini or similar modern consumer drone is probably in need of pharmaceutical help or talk therapy.

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