Someone always has to be first.  Someone had to crack open an oyster and try it.  Someone had to go in a plane.  Someone had to be like Gordon Gecko and carry a phone book sized cell phone before they were able to shrink them into a pocket.

Without the risk of the early adopters and thrill seekers, the rest of us who enjoy waiting on the sidelines would never get to experience life.

Fuji is one of those companies that likes to be first.  The company that invented digital imagery is now on the leading edge of the wave again, this time with the World’s First 3D Camera.  Sure, it’s a little bulky, expensive and if you want to print an image you have to log in to a website and have it shipped over from Japan, but they’re first.

3D is seen as, perhaps, the final frontier in digital imaging innovation.  We’ve shrunk the cameras, beefed up the megapixels and tossed a kitchen sink’s worth of accessories and features into the tiniest of pocket cams.

Just as feature film studios are seeing 3D as the saviour against piracy and the sort of thing that can save the movie going experience, photography companies are turning to 3D imagery as the next step in their evolution.

Greg Poole , VP of the Imaging Products Division of Fuji Canada is crossing Canada and showing off the FinePix REAL 3D W1 , Fuji’s first consumer level 3D product.  He says the looks he’s getting from people seeing the images on the display are similar to the amazed jaw drops he saw 15 years ago when he was debuting digital cameras to the media crows.

Poole confesses that while everyone has been working on the technology, they’ve been doing it in isolated silos.  Each manufacturer coming up with their own ideas, their own way of doing things. Despite the fact researchers are now starting to share information and work on standards, Poole admits 3D is “about 5 years away from compatibility.”

So while the $700 F inePix REAL 3D W1 may not be perfect, it is the first and it’s something we need.  Remember, unless someone risked getting pinched, we wouldn’t have known about the goodness that lies under the shell of a lobster’s tail.

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