Methodology / provenance
Every specification
has a boundary.
The index is designed to make useful facts easy to read and easy to question.
The source ladder
Start as close to the original as possible.
Manufacturer archive
Best for current product specifications, system compatibility, and brand-owned product context.
Original manual or brochure
Best for period-specific controls, formats, batteries, and details that may have disappeared from current websites.
Museum / institutional archive
Best for historical context, manufacturing history, design authorship, and cultural significance.
Brand archive / context
Useful for ownership and product-family context, but it is not counted as model-level primary verification on its own.
High-quality secondary reference
Useful for triangulation and discovery, but the page names its role rather than presenting it as a manufacturer statement.
Verification states
Confidence is a field, not a mood.
Primary source checked means the record includes a current manufacturer, manual, or institutional source that supports its high-value claims.
Reference set attached means the record has a useful source trail, but not every field should be read as independently confirmed.
Needs source review means the record can exist for research and discovery, but should not make stronger claims until the missing evidence is resolved.
Core field coverage counts only fields that apply to the camera’s format and lens arrangement. It surfaces missing evidence without treating film cameras as if they should have megapixels.
The rule is simple: data may be incomplete; it may not be invented to make the catalogue look complete.
Image rights
Rights-safe by default.
The catalogue uses abstract editorial visuals where no cleared image is attached. A real image enters a camera record only after its source page, author or owner, license, attribution, permitted reuse, and checked date are recorded; the local copy keeps that provenance beside the model.
Historical recovery
Old routes earn their way back.
Wayback inventory, historical feeds, Common Crawl, backlink targets, and rights review inform a route decision. A legacy URL is rebuilt only when there is a meaningful destination; otherwise it stays a truthful 404/410 or a clearly labelled archive reference.
See the live archive layer →