This is a Melcon II, a 35mm rangefinder camera made by Meguro Kōgaku Kōgyō in Tokyo Japan starting in 1957. The Melcon II was the follow up to the original Melcon camera, both of which were close copies of the Nikon S and S2 rangefinders. Unlike many copies of successful…
This is a Contax RX, a manual focus 35mm Single Lens Reflex made by Kyocera of Japan starting in 1994. The Contax RX was a very expensive and advanced SLR with a long list of features which catered to semi-professional and enthusiast photographers. It used the C/Y lens mount shared…
This is a Canon Pellix QL, a 35mm Single Lens Reflex camera made in Japan by Canon starting in 1966. It was an update to the original Pellix from 1965, adding Canon’s Quick Load film system and a sync port for an optional exposure booster. The Canon Pellix gets it’s…
This is a Takane Mine Six Super 66, a folding rangefinder camera made by Takane Kogaku K.K. in 1957. The Mine Six Super 66 shoots 6cm x 6cm or 4.5cm x 6cm images on 120 roll film and has a coupled coincident image rangefinder, an uncoupled selenium exposure meter, and…
This is a Yashica Electro 35 CC, a compact 35mm rangefinder camera made by Yashica of Japan from 1970 to at least 1975. Despite sharing a similar name to Yashica’s popular Electro 35 series, this camera has a much smaller body with several important upgrades from those larger cameras. The…
This is a Zenit 16, a 35mm SLR made by Krasnogorski Mekhanicheskii Zavod (KMZ) in the former Soviet Union between the years of 1973 to 1977. It uses the M42 screw mount and has a CdS exposure meter with over and under indicators visible in the viewfinder. The Zenit 16…
This is a Super Deluxe 1.7 rangefinder camera, produced by Mamiya Optical Co. starting in 1964. The Mamiya Super Deluxe was a premium 35mm rangefinder and was Mamiya’s first camera to feature a CdS exposure meter. Although the Super Deluxe has a non-removable lens, there were three versions available of…
This is a Lordomat C35, a 35mm rangefinder camera made by Leidolf Wetzlar in Wetzlar, West Germany starting in 1956. The Lordomat C35 is a variant of the original Lordomat from 1954, adding an uncoupled selenium exposure meter with exposure calculator and a separate auxiliary viewfinder for 35mm, 90mm, and…
I woke up this morning and saw a link someone sent me to Chris Sherlock’s YouTube channel and I thought, hmm, I wonder what exciting new camera Chris is taking on today. Quickly though, I saw the purpose of the short 46 second clip, in which Chris announces his retirement…
This is an Ilford Witness, a 35mm rangefinder camera made in 1953 by Peto Scott Electrical Instruments for Ilford of London, England. The Witness was a very ambitious camera, first designed in 1947 by ex employees of Leitz and Zeiss-Ikon. It incorporated a unique hybrid screw/bayonet lens mount, focal plane…
This is a Minolta Vectis S-1, one of only two Single Lens Reflex models developed by Minolta for use with the Advanced Photo System (APS) film format. The camera was made in Malaysia starting in 1996 and was a full system camera with a brand new and unique Minolta V…
Boy, am I excited about this! For the past several months, I have been in the works negotiating with my good friend and fellow blogger, Ken Rockwell about a partnership between our two sites. I have been on the edge of my seat wanting to make this announcement, but I…
