I joined Opal back in 2022.

With their first camera starting to roll out to the market, Opal was at a point where it needed to transition from stealth mode and establish itself. This was the moment to humbly and broadly share their philosophy, the people behind the company, and the beliefs that guided them to release a webcam and enter a market that had long been neglected.

Both founders shared a deep obsession with good design. That obsession was a big reason the C1 resonated so strongly. It struck a chord. It brought care and quality to a market full of cheap, plastic, subpar cameras.

That love for design quickly shaped everything in our new office—from books to testing devices, old and new, CRT screens, devices from Sony’s golden era mixed with the latest tech releases. A messy space worth visiting. It all came together to shape an environment that admired and cared for the design of everyday things.

My role as Head of Design was not to reinvent that culture, but to listen to it. To understand the beliefs, the small signals, formalize that culture, define what we should care about and channel that into our next set of products, both software and hardware, and our coms.

What follows is a compilation of some small moments that shaped Opal and happened in between the big launches.