realme and Ricoh GR Unite to Redefine Mobile Street Photography with GT 8 Pro

realme CMO Chase Xu Talks with Kazunobu Saiki, General Manager of Camera Business Division at RICOH IMAGING COMPANY LTD.

• realme and RICOH IMAGING to Announce Official Strategic Partnership on Smartphone Imaging, Teasing the Industry’s Deepest Imaging Collaboration in Street Photography. 
• Four years in the making, this imaging collaboration will debut with the GT 8 Pro series and boasts deep customization to enhance every shutter press for users and co-promote street photography culture.

realme, India’s most popular smartphone brand among young users, today announced a strategic partnership with RICOH IMAGING COMPANY LTD., set to officially launch on October 14 in Beijing, China.

After four years of preparation, this collaboration is positioned as one of the industry’s most profound imaging partnerships. To celebrate, the two companies released the “4 Years in One Snap” video, highlighting four years of co-engineering and teasing features of their first co-created product, designed specifically for the realme GT 8 Pro.

A Joint Journey Starting from Mobile User Pain Points

In the video, realme Vice President and CMO Chase Xu discussed with Kazunobu Saiki, General Manager of Camera Business Division at RICOH IMAGING COMPANY LTD., the elements that brought two brands together, which grounded on a shared understanding of user demands. realme saw that young people struggled with two main pain points in mobile photography: increasingly similar hardware and over-processed algorithms that stripped photos of authenticity. “People are getting tired of the same ‘perfect style’ photos. More and more, everyone wants to show their own style, instead of copying the same look.” Chase Xu explained.

The RICOH GR series has been known as a “street photography hero” because of its sharp quality, portability, and quick response. “That’s exactly what we value,” Xu said. Saiki echoed this: “RICOH Imaging and realme share a base of young, creative users. Our collaboration is not only about innovation in products, but also about culture to inspire a new generation to enjoy street photography and discover the beauty of everyday life.”

This shared spirit is why the two brands came together: to give young people tools that allow for authentic capture and personal expression, carrying the tradition of conventional camera into mobile photography.

The GT 8 Pro Brings GR Heritage to Young People’s Pocket

Through extensive customizations between realme and RICOH GR’s R&D teams, the GT 8 Pro offers an unprecedented imaging experience, achieving groundbreaking innovations in optical capabilities, color algorithms, imaging tones, and a tailor-made UI design that mimics the feel of a RICOH GR camera.

This device seamlessly blends 30 years of RICOH GR heritage, including its iconic film-like aesthetic and five classic image tones, with realme’s strengths in mobile imaging and profound insights into the preferences of current generations, creating a unique synergy that advances street photography culture through joint development and co-engineering. More than just a competition of specifications or uniform filters, it infuses mood and emotional warmth into every photo, encouraging young users to document their daily lives with authenticity.

“Snap By No Rules”

This partnership isn’t just about a product, it’s about extending street photography culture into the mobile era. 4 Years in One Snap marks a milestone, encouraging young people to freely record and express their lives. “It’s a fresh, young way to take photos. You don’t wait or try to make the perfect shot but just press the button and capture the moment - Snap by No Rules,” said Xu

Through this collaboration, we hope that even those who don't usually use dedicated camera would experience snapshot photography with the GT 8 Pro, Saiki noted.

The journey now heads toward October 14, when realme and Ricoh GR’s partnership will make its official debut, ushering in a new era of mobile street photography.

Huawei's Announces the Grand Launch of its Next Image Awards; World's Leading Online Mobile Photography Competition

Huawei has also announced the launch of the fourth edition of its legendary Next Image Awards. Huawei's Next Image Awards is one of the world's best online photography awards that is committed to broaden the horizon of visual culture and encourage mobile photography worldwide.

The "NEXT" in NEXT-IMAGE refers to the next generation of photographers using the next generation of tools to create and spread the next generation of visual content - all with new forms of interaction and feedback. The "IMAGE" part of the name refers to both static imagery and new forms of dynamic visual expression.

Huawei has proposed the "NEXT-IMAGE" concept not only to highlight the many years of innovative spirit it has brought to the field of visual expression, but also to create a new word that conveys its insight into what it believes is growing into a new school of photography. In 2019, more than 150 + countries participated and over 520,000 entries were received.

The competition requires the participants to send their best photograph, which will be meticulously judged by the jury members. Under the umbrella of the competition lies six categories, one of which a participant must stick to while submitting his/her entry. The participants have to send their entries and brownie points will be awarded to shots taken through a Huawei phone. Apart from the 3 grand prizes of USD $10,000 each, each of the 6 categories will have its own winners. Fifty runner ups can also win the flagship Huawei P40 Pro smartphone each.

The six categories are as follows -

1. Near Far - Discovering new places and new experiences thereby using new features of phone camera, for instance tele-photo, super-wide angle or macro-shooting lens.


2. Good Night - Capturing fun moments in low light.


3. Hello Life! - Sharing the emotion or the inspiration in everyday experiences.


4. Faces - Experimenting with identity and the power of portraiture of you yourself, her/him/it or them.


5. Live Moments - Filming stories in less than 10 minutes (at least 10 seconds, mp4 only).


6. Storyteller - Sequencing 3 to 9 photos to express the emotion, to record the changes or to find a trend.

The jury consists of eminent photographers such as Steven McCurry and Elizaveta Porodina, along with Li Changzhu, Vice President of Handsets Product Line of Huawei CBG and Andrew Garrihy, Western Europe CMO of Huawei CBG.

"Huawei's Next Image Awards is one of the world's most well-known online photography competitions. Since 2017, more than 150 countries have participated and we have received more than 1 million submissions. We extend the invitation to all photography enthusiasts worldwide to participate in the contest and win exciting prizes of upto USD $10,000. We truly believe that a photograph is worth a thousand words and has the ability to capture the beauty all around us," said Huawei's spokesperson.

The entries are open from March 26th 2020, and will close on 31st July, 2020.

About Huawei Consumer BG

Huawei's products and services are available in more than 170 countries and are used by a third of the world's population. Fifteen R&D centers have been set up in the United States, Germany, Sweden, Russia, India and China. Huawei Consumer BG is one of Huawei's three business units Smartphones, PC and tablets, wearables and cloud services, etc. Huawei's global network is built on almost 30 years of expertise in the telecom industry and is dedicated to delivering the latest technological advances to consumers around the world.

For more information, please visit: consumer.huawei.com/in.

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Plovist lets you discover the best art and artists from over 126 countries

Plovist.com is an online platform dedicated to visual artists and art lovers. At Plovist, people can create their online portfolio which can be maintained by them and people interested in their services can contact or hire the artists directly through their page or buy their artwork. The name is an acronym for 'PLatform fOr VIsual artiSTs'. Suhaas Kaul and Nikhil Manhas left high paying jobs to start this in April 2013. In a conversation with them, we learn about the journey of their startup.

We asked Suhas why he thought such a platform was needed, and he said "Currently the companies out there even in art are focusing on either e-commerce, selling of paintings and prints or just a photo sharing app. What makes us different is our platform approach where we give a platform to artists to create their portfolio, open up a virtual shop and share their art for the world to see. What we are creating is a one stop solution for artists and art lovers."

"Our efforts started showing results when an artists named Prakash G Nayak, a very profound artist, who was not able to sell his works for past few years. After contacting him and making him understand the potential of the platform he uploaded some of his artworks on our site. As a result of this the event organizers of Genslar saw his paintings and set up an exclusive exhibition featuring him in collaboration with Plovist and many of his paintings were sold to clients from US. That is the power of our platform," says Nikhil.



They conduct art events, exhibitions and online photography competitions in collaboration with organizations. "We recently conducted a photography competition with Capital One and exhibitions with Genslar, a global design and architecture firm headquartered in San Francisco, California," he adds.

They have built in house Algorithms to calculate the Artists Scores which depends on popularity of the artists, artwork uploads, likes on artworks and followers. Their 6 people team works out of Bangalore to make Plovist a synonym for Online Art. They look to acquire more users and make their platform better helping the artists to tackle major problems faced by them.

"When we started, this idea was alien for painters. The fear of somebody stealing their art, copying it, were major concerns they had. We tackled each issue by not allowing picture downloads, and making them understand that internet is the only way they can become famous and their work will reach to a global audience, which is never possible in a gallery exhibition," says Suhaas. "It has been a journey of a life time from that time. Whether it be talking to artists, whether it be going to Karnataka chitrakala parishath, briefing students about our platform, conducting exhibitions. Each and every moment has been so surreal," adds Nikhil.

As a message for future entrepreneurs, Suhaas says "Figure out your what you are doing and why your are doing it. It is very necessary because it will keep your boat sailing in hard times."