On September 17, we held the “RICOH THETA Idea Review Workshop” together with DMM.make at DMM.make AKIBA in Akihabara, Tokyo.
We suppose there are people out there among those who love and regularly use THETA who say “I wish there were more of this type of accessory or attachment available!” and they have ideas about this, right?
At Ricoh, we also want to give shape to this type of idea…That’s why we jointly held this event with DMM.make, a company that supports “Monozukuri” from various people!
The event was set up so that the idea chosen for the first prize from among users who visited the event will be made using a DMM.make 3D printer to actually give it shape. Well then, let us tell you about the event!

The event began with the THETA Business Division Manager, who is a familiar sight at these events, greeting the crowd. He gave a passionate speech about THETA. Thank you very much for that.

The THETA Business Division Manager greeting everyone

Let’s start the workshop right away!…Before starting, everyone practiced sketching together with staff from DMM.make. They showed us how to draw 3D pictures and gave us some tips.

Sketching practice!

After this, we split everyone into teams and started to put out ideas. Everyone drew pictures of their ideas in their own way.
Their drawings of THETA were great. Probably because they use THETA all the time, right? lol DMM.make staff also gave their support and gave shape to their ideas!

People sketching their ideas

There was intense interaction with people asking about ideas within their team and ideas from other teams.

Seriously discussing ideas with other teams!

After the teams had come up with some rough ideas, they selected the best idea for their team! It’s so difficult to decide which one to use from so many ideas..!

After selecting their idea, it was finally time for the team presentations. Everyone presented their team idea. They were passionate even during their presentation by saying such as “We really wanted to have this item”!

A team giving their presentation

B team giving their presentation

C team giving their presentation

Actually, we were also working on something else at the same time as the workshop…
We engraved the names of people who visited the event onto their RICOH THETA camera!
At the start of the event, we held onto THETA cameras belonging to people who wanted us to engrave their name using the DMM.make laser cutter.
The engraving was completed by the end of the event and the camera handed back to the owner.
Everyone was very happy to receive their THETA camera with their own name engraved onto it, the only such item that exists in the world.

“DMM.make” was engraved onto this THETA camera

Going back to talking about the workshop…Ricoh selected a winner from among the ideas from each team to receive first prize!
This is the idea that was chosen!

This is “THETA holder”!
This holder allows you to, for example, attach THETA to a bag strap and quickly take it out when you want to shoot. It can also be stored away with a monopod still attached. Isn’t that great!
It can also probably be used as a wearable device for such as shooting 180° with it attached to a strap on your backpack!
This work that was chosen for first prize will be created using the DMM.make laser printer and given to the winning team as a present!
We will put information such as the process used to create this item on our Facebook group page.

We also want to give a “THETA award” for an idea that was regarded highly as the runner-up but unfortunately did not receive first prize during the event!
This is the idea!

This is an attachment that secures THETA in a horizontal direction.
This idea came from the concern over the fact that the joined sections can be seen in images of the sky such as when usually shooting the starry sky!
You can also attach it to a car roof. Installing the camera horizontally enables you to reduce vibration due to air resistance while shooting!

Our staff’s opinions about this idea were that it is “Practical” and “You can easily imagine situations where it can be used” so for these reasons we chose this from the many ideas at the event.
We also had to consider whether “It can be achieved using a 3D printer” as one of the selection criteria.

Congratulations everyone on winning your prizes!

Oh, one other thing, we also gave out lunch box bags limited only to this event.
The bag design was much talked about at Ricoh for being so “Cute!” and we believe everyone was happy to receive it!

Thank you everyone for coming to the event! We will be planning other events like this in the future. We look forward to seeing people who were unable to attend this event at the next one!