Ricoh GR · on sale October 2005 · a retrospective

The Ricoh GR Digital: the one-lens compact that was always a niche

In 2005 Ricoh put a 28 mm f/2.4 lens, a magnesium body and two control dials into a pocket camera and priced it far above the zoom compacts of its day. It had no zoom, and reviewers called it hard to recommend wholeheartedly. Cameras like it are now sought after.

Compiled from Ricoh's 2005 announcement coverage, DPReview's 2006 review and two later retrospectives · we have not tested a unit yet · only one full contemporary review was found

Release date and launch price: launched October 2005; launch price Open; about £399.99 UK¹².

Meet the camera

It is a slim magnesium-alloy compact about 107 by 58 millimetres and 25 thick, and Ricoh's announcement put it at about 170 grams without battery and card.² The lens is a fixed 5.9 millimetre f/2.4 optic, equal to 28 millimetres on a 35 mm camera, with seven aperture blades and a neutral-density filter.¹² DPReview wrote that it echoes the design and ethos of Ricoh's film GR series.³

Ricoh announced it on 13 September 2005 with Japanese sales from 21 October; the suggested price was left open, and Imaging Resource quoted £399.99 in the UK, roughly US$729.¹ By August 2006 DPReview listed street prices of US$699 and £380, noting that with accessories you had spent well over $1,000.³

Why this one was interesting

A film camera's name

Imaging Resource called it long anticipated by fans of Ricoh's GR-series film cameras, and Ricoh's own release said the GR series began in 1996 as 35 mm compacts whose image quality the digital model inherited.¹²

One focal length, on purpose

There was no zoom. DPReview listed the lack of zoom among its cons, and described the camera as always going to be something of a niche product.⁵³ The designed answer was the optional 21 mm-equivalent wide converter and a shoe-mounted external viewfinder.¹²

Controls for people who shoot manually

Ricoh gave it manual, program and aperture-priority modes, shutter speeds from 180 seconds to 1/2,000 and a twin-dial layout, with aperture at the front and shutter at the back.² DPReview praised the f/2.4 aperture, the dual dials and the customisable interface.⁵

Snap focus

DPReview listed a snap (hyperfocal) focus setting for street work among its strengths.⁵ Hamish Gill, writing in 2018, said it gives very deep depth of field for focus-free shooting, so autofocus is rarely a problem in practice.⁶

What was lost

No viewfinder was built in, and the only way to frame without the screen was the optional hot-shoe finder.¹ There was no zoom and a poor movie mode, DPReview noted.⁵ Raw files took about 12.5 seconds to write.⁴

The dark and the noise: its weak point

This is where DPReview was hardest on it. It found noise visible even at ISO 64 in flat tones, shadow noise leaping up at ISO 400 and blue-tinted shadows from ISO 400 up, though it described the luminance noise as film grain-like rather than blotchy.⁴ Its conclusion called JPEGs noisy above ISO 100 and the results at ISO 400 pretty painful.⁵ Gill, in 2018, found black-and-white noise organic and avoided JPEG noise-reduction artefacts, and said low light was weak.⁶

A real photograph taken with this camera; the sensitivity shown is recorded in the file's own EXIF data.

Like that look? See recent eBay sold listings for this camera ↗

On eBay right now

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The little wins

A lens with no corner penalty

DPReview measured barrel distortion of 0.6 per cent and found little if any drop-off in sharpness at the corners.⁴

Close focus

Macro focus reached 1.5 centimetres, according to Ricoh's specification and DPReview.¹³

Raw, if you wait

DPReview found raw files showed more detail than JPEG, with no moiré or sharpening halos.⁴

The GR Digital beside its box. · John Cummings · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Commons

A viewfinder and a flash port

A hot shoe took Ricoh's optional viewfinder, and DPReview noted a dedicated TTL flash could use it too.¹⁵

A GR Digital with its lens hood and converter. · Manfred lai at English Wikiped · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Commons

Pocketable and built

DPReview scored build quality 8.5 and ergonomics 8.5 out of 10 and praised the slim build and decent battery life.⁵ The magnesium body is under 200 grams, and Askham said it is the only camera he owns that he can use comfortably one-handed.⁷

How it drew the picture

DPReview scored image quality 7.0 and optics 8.0 out of 10 and called JPEGs soft and lacking in critical detail, with raw doing better.⁵⁴ It measured resolution of about 1,550 lines per picture height horizontally and said the camera came nowhere near the top of its class, with moiré at higher frequencies.⁴ It also found colour accurate, with purple fringing around overexposed foliage and a tendency to clip highlights.⁴ Gill, shooting it in 2018, called colour not great by today's standards but liked the lens, sharp and contrasty in black and white.⁶

Photos taken with this camera, from Wikimedia Commons, credited under each picture.

Where it let you down

DPReview scored value 5.0 out of 10 and features 6.0, and said it just does not quite add up.⁵ Gill found low light and fast action to be weak points, though autofocus was rarely a problem.⁶ Askham noted that the camera is limited to 2 GB cards, which are hard to find now, and that raw writing takes up to ten seconds.⁷ Gill reported a known fault where the Adjust button can hang the camera.⁶

What reviewers said

We found only one full contemporary review of this camera, DPReview's; the other two entries are retrospectives written years later.

The timeline

• 13 September 2005Ricoh announces the GR Digital; Imaging Resource and PhotographyBLOG report it.¹²
• 21 October 2005Japanese sales begin.¹
• 21 August 2006DPReview publishes its review.³
• 14 May 201835mmc publishes a retrospective.⁶
• 11 January 2023Macfilos publishes a retrospective.⁷

Should you buy one now?

Buy one if you want a one-lens, 28 mm CCD compact for daylight and black-and-white street pictures, and you accept noise above ISO 100. What it sells for now is a question for the sold listings, not for us: we have no launch price to quote beyond Ricoh's open price and the UK £399.99.¹ Before you bid, check these:

• The name. It is the Ricoh GR Digital; later models are the GR Digital II, III and IV, which are different cameras.
• The battery. It uses a DB-60 or AAA cells;¹ a fresh battery is on Amazon ↗, and an old one may need replacing, Askham found.⁷
• The card. It takes SD and MMC cards, and Askham reports a 2 GB limit;¹⁷ see our memory card guide.
• The Adjust button. Check that it does not hang the camera.⁶
• The lens. Check that it extends and retracts cleanly.

If you are wondering why cameras like this are being hunted down again, we tell that story once, in Pictures that never left the card.

See recent sold prices on eBay ↗Shop on eBay ↗DB-60 battery ↗

Sources

1. Imaging Resource, “Ricoh announces 8-megapixel GR digital compact” by Mike Tomkins (13 Sep 2005)
2. PhotographyBLOG, “Ricoh GR Digital Announced” by Mark Goldstein (13 Sep 2005)
3. DPReview, Ricoh GR-Digital review by Simon Joinson (21 Aug 2006)
4. DPReview, Ricoh GR-Digital review, image quality page (resolution, noise, distortion, colour)
5. DPReview, Ricoh GR-Digital review, conclusion (pros, cons, scores)
6. 35mmc, “Ricoh GR Digital review: shooting a vintage digital camera” by Hamish Gill (14 May 2018)
7. Macfilos, “Ricoh GR Digital: resurrecting a pioneering camera from 2005” by David Askham (11 Jan 2023)

Camera photos by yoppy (CC BY 2.0), chia ying Yang (CC BY-SA 2.0), Manfred Lai (CC BY-SA 3.0) and John Cummings (CC BY-SA 4.0); other photographs are credited under each one, all via Wikimedia Commons. Links to eBay and Amazon are affiliate links.