Father of "PEN" passed away at 76

Yoshihisa Maitani, the visionary designer who created the popular Pen series of cameras for Olympus, passed away last night at a hospital in Tokyo.

Yoshihisa Maitani with the Olympus Pen F. (Photo: Olympus)

The Pen F, I wish I had collected one in my younger day!

Maitani has a special lecture series on the design of PEN, XA and OM series of cameras that has influenced camera design right to the cameras that we are using today. The web lectures can be found here and here.

RIP Master Maitani, we are happy that you at least saw the "rebirth" of the Pen; in the form of E-P1!


Famous Last Words:

"Deciding which products to make is the same as deciding how to live your life.

What matters most is your vision. You must have a vision, a dream, a philosophy, for the course of your future will change depending on whether or not you have a vision.

You can't simply drift through life nonchalantly; the first step is to decide what you want to do with the rest of your life."

"We have a saying in Japanese that fire and water are good servants, but bad masters. Although the camera should be an inseparable part of the photographer, it is still a tool. It can be a help or hindrance depending on how it’s used.""Photography has many different roles and education is one of its most important. The photograph is valuable in conveying what only you can see and therefore, understand. The photograph’s value is in its ability to act as an extension of the human eye. There will always be a need for photographs as long as people use their eyes."

- Yoshihisa Maitani -