The Olympus wants you to take pictures of your food with the Stylus 500

You know how we joke about how everything in Japan is craziness times a million? Well, we're not joking anymore. The new five megapixel Olympus Stylus 500 digital camera has all sorts of different picture modes, you know like portrait, landscape, sports, but it also has one other setting, "Cuisine," that's designed to cash in on what is supposed to be the big new trend in Tokyo right now: taking a picture of your restaurant meal before you get down to business. (Yes, we know this isn't the first Olympus camera with a "Cuisine" mode, we'd just been to busy not taking pictures of all our meals to notice).

[Jy @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Pentax also has "Food" mode.

[Psymon @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Althought we are not Japanese, this sounds perfect for my wife... who is currently crazy about her Blog... which happens to have a section to show people how to cook Taiwan / Chinese cusines!!!

http://www.wretch.cc/blog/joeyliu&category_id=126790

(oops... it's in Chinese and so are we!)

BTW, my first post / comment on Engadget.... Congrats on the recent Weblog Awards, you guys rock!

[David Campbell @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

This isn't really a new thing. It has been common with Japanese tourists forever. I don't know how many pictures of airline food I have seen.

[Thomas @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

my pentax s5i has a "food" mode....along with about 19 other choices..

always wondered about the food preset....

t

[Joseph T. @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Strangely, I often take pictures of my food. Why? No reason. It usually looks so pretty and artsy. Plus, my 1gb memory stick goes a lonnnngggg way.

[Jen @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Hhehehehe... Perfect for me and what I call my "food porn" though I use a canon and the marco shot. Been doing this for a few years and haven't noticed too many people doing it, so it's nice to see that I'm not the only one!

[tastingmenu @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Wow. A Japanese trend I've actually gotten ahead of. I've been taking pictures of my food for 3 years now. :)

[TheMatt @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Well, now I know what camera to use for http://www.airlinemeals.net . :) I keep wondering what the difference is between macro and food...

[overlunch @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

I bought a Sony U30 a while back because I wanted a small camera to use to take food pictures. My cellphone camera just wasn't up to the task. I haven't taken any food pictures for a while, and now my blog has just text.

Wow, if this is such a big Japanese trend, maybe I should start using my camera more ... or even buy one of the Olympus camera'a with cuisine mode!

[ArC @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

What does food mode do? Set a slightly reddish colour balance?

[Ben Dummett @ Dec 19th 2005 12:08AM]

Yeah, I was wonderin' what it actual did.

Any help?