In Osaka, Japan, 1928, Kazuo Tashima formed the company that would become Minolta. A company that grew strong and prospered to become a leader in camera manufacturing and sales throughout the world. And the company that introduced the first full system of autofocus SLR photography... Maxxum. Minolta was not only successful with the Maxxum line, but with their full range of photographic products.

The success of the Minolta sales force in selling their full line of cameras provided an opportunity for Minolta US and Minolta Japan to hold a joint National Sales Meeting in Osaka at the company headquarters. Factory tours and joint General Session meetings provided ample time for the American and Japanese staffs to forge friendships that lasted for many years to come.

As he had recently passed away, a tribute to Mr. Tashima, or, "KT" as he was affectionately known, would be the centerpiece of the meeting.

The show was produced simultaneously in English, Japanese, and German with show tapes with English and one other language available for international presentation. At the Japan meeting, Minolta installed a simultaneous translation system so the very few Japanese staff who were not proficient in English would still be able to enjoy the program. Later in the year, the show was presented in Germany, also in its large screen format, during Minolta's annual distributor meeting during Photokina.

The Minolta internal Production Group created and staged this tribute to Mr. Tashima. Though the show was originally presented in Osaka on an 8'x24' screen, and in Germany on a 10' x 30' screen, it was designed to have the center section transferred to video with no black band at the top and bottom, and no loss of important information by cropping the sides to fit a video format.

Distribution video copies of the show were made available in all three languages.

The show was a huge success when it was used to open the meeting in Japan to a large international audience. Mr. Tashima's wife and family, who attended the event, were moved to tears by the honest and affectionate telling of KT's story. And it set the tone for the meeting with Mr. Tashima's high moral standards and dedication to his company and its people. It also was used for many years by Minolta Corporation to open "Welcome to Minolta" meetings for each class of new hires.

The show also went on to earn; a Gold Cindy from the Association of Visual Communicators, a Cindy Award, Special Achievement for Exceptional Cultural Understanding, from the Association of Visual Communicators, a Cindy Award, Special Achievement for Music and Still Photography, also from the Association of Visual Communicators, a Gold Plaque from Intercom; The Industrial Film Festival of the Chicago International Film Festival, and a Silver Award in the Recognition Category at the International Multi-Image Festival.

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