A friend brought out a "Camp Snap"[0] camera at an event the other day, and the thing everybody enjoyed about it was that it didn't immediately bring the whole internet into our event. It doesn't even have a screen.
I would pay good money for a digital camera that could take photos as well as the average flagship phone and fit as easily in a pocket (and I'm a woman, so I'm including sometimes pathetic little pockets), but they could only be tweaked and edited later, on a computer or companion device.
I think that desire for spaces occupied only by the people in them, not the whole rest of the world and its opinions, explains even more of this trend than the aesthetic of the photos.
What you are looking for is a Ricoh GR III or IIIx [0] (same camera, different fixed lens focal length). It's super pocketable, and you can turn the screen off completely, although it doesn't have a viewfinder, so with the screen off you can't really know what you are framing - it could be fun to try and guess after getting the hang of it.
Image quality would be much better even than the latest flagship phones.
Finally, you can browse the images on the camera afterwards and wirelessly transmit the ones you want to edit/post to your phone/tablet/computer. You can also have presets for color filters and highlight/shadow tones, so you don't really need to edit in post if you prefer.
It's truly a great little camera, and the price is not that bad (usually around $1000, but can be found for less, or you could go with the previous model, GR II).
There's not a chance in the world that thing fits in women's pants pockets!
What I'm looking for has the form factor of a phone (potentially even much smaller) and a camera like a phone, but all it does is take pictures. I'm fine with seeing the pictures on a screen, just not editing them.
It's 4cm shorter and 1cm narrower than an iPhone 16. Of course it's also 4x thicker (~8mm vs 33mm).
Another alternative would be getting something like this: https://www.amazon.com/Nikon-Coolpix-Digitalkamera-Megapixel... although I am not sure about the quality of images you can get from that.
I was hoping for something that's been manufactured more recently than 5 years ago, but I do wish that type of device had caught on better than it did.
I would pay good money for a digital camera that could take photos as well as the average flagship phone and fit as easily in a pocket (and I'm a woman, so I'm including sometimes pathetic little pockets), but they could only be tweaked and edited later, on a computer or companion device.
I think that desire for spaces occupied only by the people in them, not the whole rest of the world and its opinions, explains even more of this trend than the aesthetic of the photos.
[0] https://www.campsnapphoto.com/collections/camp-snap-screen-f...