Cologne, Germany  - Photography-mad families in Germany are buying children their own cameras as gifts to celebrate the first day at school, an industry group said Wednesday at the Photokina trade show in Cologne.

Rainer Schmidt, secretary of the German photo industry federation PIV, said in an interview that the days when each family had only one camera, which was used mainly by the father, were over.

German children were being given cameras of their own by the early teenage years at the latest, with surveys showing 24 per cent of girls and 18 per cent of boys under 13 in Germany already had their own cameras.

"Children love to experiment with images," he said. "They take pictures of themselves lying on the floor, or try and photograph flies from all sorts of odd perspectives."

He was speaking at Photokina, the major trade fair for cameras, which is held every two years in Cologne.

PIV says the trade is making a much bigger effort than in the past to win sales among women and teenagers. (dpa)