This is a Jena Contax, a 35mm rangefinder camera made by Carl Zeiss Jena, in Saalfeld, Germany under direction of the Soviet government after World War II. In the time leading up to Germany’s loss in the war, the Soviet Union had eyed the Zeiss-Ikon Contax for war reparations and…
This is an Ontoflex Modele B, a Twin Lens Reflex camera made by G. Cornu in Paris, France starting in 1934 to around 1940. The Ontoflex has an all metal body and shoots 6cm x 9cm images on Kodak’s 620 roll film, via a rotating film back which allowed it…
This is a Voigtländer Prominent, a folding bed rangefinder camera made by Voigtländer & Sohn AG in Braunschweig, Germany starting in 1932. The Prominent shoots both 6cm x 9cm and 4.5cm x 6cm images on 120 format roll film. Shooting of the smaller exposures requires a removable mask to be…
10 years of camera reviews… I could just end this post here and I’ll have said all that I probably need to, but if there’s one thing that writing camera reviews for the past decade has taught me, is that I am not good at brevity. I’ve shared the origin…
This is a Detrola 400, a 35mm rangefinder camera made by the Detrola Corp in Detroit, MI, USA between the years 1940 and 1941. The Detrola 400 was the most advanced camera produced by Detrola and would turn out to be its last before the company stopped producing cameras in…
This is an Opema II, a 35mm rangefinder camera made by Meopta in Přerov, Czechoslovakia starting in 1954. The Opema II featured a coupled rangefinder, cloth focal plane shutter with top 1/500 speed and an interchangeable 38mm thread mount for changing lenses. Although very similar to the 39mm thread mount…
This is a Konica Recorder DD, a half frame 35mm point and shoot camera made by Konica of Japan starting in 1985. The “DD” in the model name indicates that this was a version of the camera with a data back as compared with the non DD model which was…
This review is part of the Cameras of the Dead series which features dead cameras that I’ve wanted to review that either didn’t work, or was otherwise unable to shoot. In the past, these reviews used to come out in a set of three every Halloween or what I called…
This is an Alpa Reflex, a 35mm single lens reflex and rangefinder camera made by Pignons S.A. in Ballaigues, Switzerland between the years 1944 and 1952. The Alpa Reflex was the first generation of Alpa cameras and is one of only a very few reflex cameras to also feature a…
This is a National Graflex Series II, a single lens reflex camera made by the Folmer Graflex Corporation in Rochester, New York, USA between the years 1934 and 1941. The National Graflex makes ten 2¼” x 2½” exposures on a roll of 120 roll film, has a cloth focal plane…
This is a Yashica Dental-Eye, a 35mm SLR camera made by Kyocera starting in 1985. The Dental-Eye, as the name suggests, is a specialized camera produced primarily for the dental industry allowing for extreme closeups, but it was also used by eye doctors and in other specialized medical and scientific…
This is an Ensign Commando, a folding roll film camera made by Barnet Ensign Ltd. between the years 1945 and 1949. The Ensign Commando shoots both 6cm x 6cm and 4.5cm x 6cm images on 120 format roll film and was originally made for the British military near the end…
