The company's founders Paul Franke and Reinhold Heidecke wanted to build cameras which were perfect and easy to handle.   They wanted to make photography not only accessible to the professional photographer but to the wide range of amateurs.

In 1929, the result was the legendary "twin-lens" which became the standard tool of professional photographers and the dream of every amateur enthusiast.

The "twin-lens" formed the beginning of a long line of product developments. Others followed and among them the launch of the Rollei 35 in 1966, the Rollei SL 66 with the first electronically controlled medium format camera Rolleiflex SLX, the 35 mm SLR camera SL 2000F with interchangeable magazines or the dissolve projectors which still are unique.

After a long and changing history, Rollei presents itself today as the specialist for high quality and demanding photographic tasks, in particular for the recording and projection of pictures for the professional photographer and the upper end of the amateur sector.

These days, Rollei have started to produce and introduce their digital camera line ups and one of them is this small real compact size digital point-&-shoot camera.

Rollei Compactline 81 - 18mm flat

• CMOS sensor : 1/2.5", 8 megapixels CMOS
• Image resolution : 3264x2448(8M), 2560x1920 (5M), 2048x1536 (3M), 640x480 (VGA)
• Image file format : JPEG EXIF 2.2, DCF compatible, DPOF support, PictBridge compatible
• Video clip : 640x480 (VGA), 320x240 (QVGA)
• Image storage : SD card, SDHC card upto 4GB (optional)
• Internal memory : 16MB
• Lens : f = 7.1mm (35mm film equivalent: 42mm) F3.2
• Zoom : 4x digital zoom
• Normal focus range : 115cm - infinity
• Macro focusing : 60cm - 115cm
• ISO : Auto, 50, 100, 200
• Shutter : 1/1000 - 1 sec
• Exposure compensation : Auto, Manual +/-2 EV in 1/3 increments
• White balance : Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent
• Flash : Auto, Fill in, Off
• Self-timer : 2, 10 sec
• LCD monitor : 2.36" TFT colour LCD
• Interface : USB2.0 Full speed
• Power source : Alkaline battery 2x AAA
• Size : 90 x 55 x 18 mm
• Weight : 82g (without battery and SD card)

Comment
This is a very cheap 8 megapixel digital camera and comes with a retail price of around US$ 80.00 or less.   Very light weight and fits into your regular shirt's pocket and offers simple to use and to understand navigation controls.

However; i do find the video recording with out sound recording features to be not practical at all.   Overall, I do enjoy taking photos with this Rollei 18mm Compactline and would recommend it still to all of My Friends and family.