Graflex Century Graphic (1947-1970)

The Graflex Century Graphic is a miniature press camera that was made by Graflex Inc. in Rochester, New York, from 1947 to 1970. Press cameras were made to meet the needs of newspaper photographers and are of robust construction.

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The Century folds into a fairly compact package. The photographer presses a hidden button on the top of the camera to release the lens bed and opens it until it locked into place. He then draws out the lens standard until it hits the infinity stops on the rails and locks it into place. The camera has limited movements on the front: rise, shift and tilt, and the bed can be dropped. The drop bed and front rise are useful to get the front of the lens bed out of the picture with wide angle lenses. The shifts are available only with lenses that have focal lengths longer than normal because otherwise the front lens standard hits the lens bed struts.

The camera has an open frame viewfinder and could come with an optional optical viewfinder. Focusing is by ground glass with the camera on a tripod, by the focusing scale located on the lens bed or by an optional Kalart coupled range finder.

The Century could be customized with a variety of lenses and shutters. This example has an f/4.5 103mm Graflex Trioptar lens made by Wollensak in a Graflex Century shutter also made by Wollensak. This was the lowest price combination. Better lenses and shutters made by Eastman Kodak Company also were available, for example the f/4.5 101mm Kodak Ektar in a Kodak Flash Supermatic shutter. Other lenses by manufacturers such as Zeiss or Schneider, and shutters such as the Compur Rapid were imported from Germany. The size of the lens board and the length of the bellows draw limit the diameter and focal length of the lenses that can be used. The focusing scales on the lens bed need to be matched to the lens for scale focusing to work. The Kalart rangefinder also needs to be adjusted to match the lens. Ground glass focusing works with any lens without any further adjustments.

A Century Graphic came with a removable ground glass back for 2-1/4" x 3-1/4" sheet film in holders, two sheets to a holder, and had a Graflok back for the optional roll film holders. The "23" roll film holder is for eight 2-1/4" x 3-1/4" pictures on 120 film. A "22" roll film holder for twelve 2-1/4" square pictures on 120 film also was available. The roll film holders had dark slides, which allowed the film holders to be removed mid-roll without wasting a picture. If you don't want to handle individual sheets of film in a darkroom, a roll film holder is desirable.

You needed to have the camera on a tripod to use ground glass focusing. You opened the shutter, focused and composed the picture on the ground glass as in a view camera, closed the shutter, set the taking aperture and shutter speed, inserted the loaded sheet film holder, pulled out the dark slide on the sheet film holder, exposed the film, replaced the dark slide and took the exposed film to the darkroom in the holder. Hand-holding the camera, you would focus using the distance scale on the lens bed or the Kalart range finder and compose the picture using the open frame finder or the optical finder. Using the roll film holder is like using any other roll film camera. When you use the roll film holder it puts your eye a little farther from the optical finder than when you use  the ground glass back.

This camera attracts attention when out in public. Unfortunately the bellows on my 70 year old example has developed a light leak and it is out of commission right now. I have a replacement bellows and just need to get around to putting in the new one. The half-silvered glass beam splitter on the rangefinder has tarnished and the focusing patch is only faintly reflected. Deteriorated beam splitters are common.  Replacing the beam splitter is possible, but requires cutting a replacement to fit.

A gnarly tree in Centennial Park, Nashville, Tennessee, pre-light leak.

Advertisement, Popular Photography, April, 1950.

Kodak VR35 K12 (1986-1989)

Eastman Kodak Company stopped making 35 mm cameras in 1969 owing to the phenomenal success of the cartridge loading Instamatic cameras. The popularity of cartridge loading cameras gradually declined as compact point-and-shoot cameras with autofocus and automatic film loading became available.  Kodak re-introduced a new line of point-and-shoot 35 mm cameras in 1986 and discontinued the last of the Instamatic cameras in 1988. This camera was manufactured for Kodak by Chinon Industries. Kodak had a close relationship with Chinon and eventually bought the company in 2004.

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The K12 has a plastic body with a flip up flash. The lens is a four element, f/2.8 35 mm Kodak Ektar lens with an aspherical lens element that was made by Eastman in Rochester, NY. The shutter is electronically timed from 1/8 to 1/500 second. The film is advanced automatically after each picture and rewinds automatically at the end of the roll. Flipping up the flash uncovers the lens and turns on the camera. Auto focusing is by an infrared sensor through two "eyes" next to the lens. Exposure is programmed auto exposure. Film speed is set to ASA 100, 200, 400 or 1000 by the DX code on the film cassette. Operation is almost completely automatic. This is a camera in the tradition of the first Kodak of 100 years earlier - "You press the button and we do the rest." The controls are the shutter button, a self-timer switch, a switch for fill flash in daylight, and a switch to rewind the film mid-roll. The flash fires automatically in low light. The camera takes a now-discontinued size 323, 9V lithium battery. A 9V transistor radio battery will power the camera, but runs down pretty quickly. The use of a transistor radio battery was anticipated by Kodak because the battery compartment has contacts for the transistor radio and a sticker to show the right way to put it in. The list price was an expensive $200 in 1986. It was discontinued in 1989. They are cheap today. The K12 was the second best of the VR35s. The top of the line K14 "Medalist" was similar, but had in addition a data back to imprint the date on the negative, and a switch to turn off the flash. The bottom of the line VR35 K2 had a hot shoe for flash, a fixed focus, fixed aperture lens, a single shutter speed, and manual film advance and rewind.

The VR35 name ties in with the Kodak VR-G film that came out about the same time. VR technology is still used in current Kodak film.

Ricoh KR-10M (1990)

My sister-in-law gave me this Ricoh KR-10M camera that once belonged to her late father. Unfortunately the camera had been dropped on its nose at some point and the Vivitar 70-210 mm zoom lens that was on it was broken. The camera apparently survived the fall otherwise intact, so I replaced the broken Vivitar with a Ricoh f/2 50 mm lens from eBay.

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The KR-10M has a plastic body with a metal lens mount. It takes four AA batteries and has motorized film advance and rewind. The lens mount is a Pentax K-mount bayonet. Pentax licensed the K-mount to numerous manufacturers, making a wide variety of K-mount lenses readily available. Pentax screw mount lenses also work with an adapter. There are control buttons (shutter release, self-timer, mode, up and down setting selections) and an LCD status display (battery indicator, shutter speed, exposure counter, film advance indicator, film loaded indicator, multiple exposure mode indicator, continuous photography mode indicator) on the top.  The back of the camera has a film ID window, the film rewind button, and a socket for the shutter remote.  The front has the release button for the lens, the auto exposure lock button and the flashing LED for the self timer.  The bottom has a tripod socket.

The camera has through-the-lens metering with either manual exposure or aperture priority auto exposure. It also has auto-bracketing auto exposure to allow you to take three pictures, one at the metered exposure, one with 1/2-stop more exposure, and one with 1/2-stop less exposure. Film speed is automatically set by the DX code on the film cassette. The film speed defaults to ISO 100 for a non-DX coded cassette. An exposure compensation setting allows you to manually change the rated film speed by +/- 4 stops.  With a non-DX coded cassette you can set the film speed from ISO 6 (increase exposure 4 stops from ISO 100) to 1600 (decrease exposure 4 stops from ISO 100).  The camera will read the number of exposures on a DX coded cassette and automatically rewind the film once the rated number of exposures have been made.  On a non-DX coded cassette the camera just stops when it reaches the end of a roll.  You have to rewind the film manually by using a pen to press the recessed film rewind button.  You also can rewind any film in the middle of a roll.  The camera leaves the tip of the film leader sticking out, which is handy when you reload the film later to finish the roll.

The shutter is vertically running and electronically timed. The shutter speed in auto exposure mode varies from 1/2000 second to 32 seconds. In manual mode you can set the shutter speed from 1/2000 to 16 seconds.  Flash sync speed is 1/60 second set manually with a non-dedicated flash unit or 1/100 second set automatically with a Ricoh dedicated flash unit.  The frame rate is three pictures per second with the camera set for continuous photography.

The viewfinder has a diagonal split-image focusing aid and displays the shutter speed at the bottom of the viewfinder.  

The original list price for the camera and an f/2 50mm lens was $376 in 1990.  In 1992 Popular Photography reported that the street price was about $200. The KR-10M was considered an entry level SLR.

Ricoh began in 1937 as  Riken Kogaku Kogyo K.K. (Riken Optical Industries Co., Ltd.)  It was a spin-off from Riken (Institute of Physical and Chemical Research). Riken Optical Industries changed its name to Ricoh in 1963.  Ricoh acquired Pentax in 2011, and still makes digital cameras under the Pentax name.

Push button control is not my favorite way to set a camera.  Using the exposure compensation control to set the ISO for a non-DX coded cassette is awkward because the exposure compensation setting reverts to zero whenever the camera is turned off. The fact that the camera uses AA batteries instead of an expensive lithium battery is a positive feature.

RCA Logo, RCA Studio B, Nashville, Tennessee

Argus Golden Shield C3 (1960-1961)

The Golden Shield C3 was a variation on the Argus Match-Matic C3 (see the post for July 12, 2018), the main difference being the silvery front and rear panels instead of the tan and black panels of the Match-Matic.

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The Golden Shield Corporation, Great Neck, NY, was formed in 1959 to distribute under its own name consumer products such as radios, phonographs and television sets that were made by other companies. One of Golden Shield's owners and suppliers was Sylvania Electric and its Argus subsidiary (Argus Cameras had become part of Sylvania in 1958). Only about 3,000 Golden Shield Arguses were made.

Minox B (1958-1968)

Minox B

The Minox was advertised as a go anywhere pocket camera, but the small size and the ability to focus as close as 8 inches also made the camera famous as a spy camera. The Minox B was the most popular sub-miniature Minox. About 380,000 were made from 1958 to 1968 in West Germany. This little Minox B was made in 1964.

The camera has an aluminum body with a scale focusing f/3.5 15mm Complan lens and a shutter running from 1/1000 to 1/2 second plus B (bulb) and T (time). There is an unlabeled dot between 2 and B on the shutter speed dial, but that appears to set the shutter at 1/2, too. You open and close the camera using a sliding action that cocks the shutter and advances the film. The negative is a tiny 11 mm wide by 8 mm high.

The built-in selenium cell light meter can be set for film speeds from 25 to 400 ASA. The light meter is coupled to the shutter speed setting. For correct exposure you match the shutter speed to the meter reading by lining up the triangle on the scale with the needle on the meter. For exposure control a built-in neutral density filter with a 10x filter factor can slide over the lens. The camera automatically adjusts the light meter for this filter setting and allows you to take pictures in yt?bright sunlight with fast film. For exposure or contrast control with black and white film, a built-in green filter with a filter factor of 2 can slide over the lens. To set the shutter speed with the green filter in place you match the dot on the light meter scale to the needle.

Minox also made appropriately small accessories for the Minox camera, including a daylight film developing tank, a tripod adapter, a flash attachment, etc.

Blue Moon Camera and Machine, Portland, Oregon, still loads film into Minox cartridges. You can get Minox film directly from Blue Moon or from the Film Photography Project store and other retailers.

Schermerhorn Symphony Center, Nashville, Tennessee, in 2016.

Post-war Kodak Retina II (Type 011)

This Kodak Retina II was part of the revival of West German camera manufacturing from the devastation of the Second World War. Eastman Kodak Company had lost control of its German subsidiary, Kodak AG, because of the war and acted quickly to recover its investment after the war. The film factory was unavailable because it was in the Russian Zone. The camera factory was in the American Zone and therefore was in a better position to be restarted, although the plant had been converted to make fuzes for anti-aircraft projectiles and had damage from USAAF bombing raids. Production of new Retina cameras started in late 1945.

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My camera was made for the U S Army PX system in late 1947. It has a Kodak Ektar f/2 47 mm lens made by Eastman Kodak Co. in Rochester, New York. The lens has a serial number of EO7592, which indicates that the lens was made in 1946 (E = 4 and O = 6), and it has the circled "L" symbol that indicates it has anti-reflection coatings. Kodak had produced the same lens for the Kardon camera that was made by the Precision Instrument Co., New York, for the US Army Signal Corps. The shutter is a Deckel Compur Rapid shutter that is not synchronized for flash. It has a serial number 6166592, which indicates that the shutter was made in 1947. The body has a serial number of 114031. Shutter speeds run from 1 second to 1/500 second in the old shutter speed sequence of 1, 1/2, 1/5, 1/10, 1/25, 1/50, 1/100, 1/250 and 1/500, and the shutter has a B (bulb) setting. The shutter speeds run slow on my camera. I need to send it for service before I use it.

The camera has a knob wind and rewind. The shutter release plunger and the cable release socket are located on the body. You use a lever on the lens to cock the shutter because it is not cocked by winding the film. The exposure counter is manually reset to 1 and counts up. The top deck has an accessory shoe. I can slip a shoe mount light meter into mine. The rewind knob pulls up to make it a little easier to rewind the film. The rewind-advance selection lever is on the back of the camera.

The post-war Retina II resembles the pre-war Retina IIa, which was not sold in the USA.

Ansco Memo (1928)

The Ansco Memo was a single frame (what nowadays is called a half-frame) 35 mm camera made in Binghampton, New York. It was one of the first American-made 35 mm cameras.

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Inside of Back

The body on my camera is wood with leather covering. Other versions of the Memo were polished wood and there was a Boy Scout version in khaki paint. The lens is a fixed focus f/6.3 Wollensak Velostigmat lens in a self-setting shutter. It wasn't marked with a focal length. Aperture settings were marked f/6.3, 8, 11 and 16. Shutter speeds were 1/25, 1/50, 1/100, B (bulb) and T (time). There wasn't any provision for a cable release. The film load was a strip of perforated 35 mm film, the same film used in a motion picture camera, in a metal container. The film would be threaded into an identical take-up container, and advanced by moving a slide on the back of the camera. The slide had two claws that engaged the perforations on the film, the same way film was advanced in a motion picture camera. This system was used in the later Agfa Memo in 1939. The exposure counter had to be manually reset after loading film and counted up to 50. It was actuated by the shutter, not by the film advance mechanism.

The Memo came in versions with a fixed focus f/6.3 lens, a focusing f/6.3 lens or a focusing f/3.5 lens. Ansco also sold a film strip projector, an enlarger and other gadgets for the Memo. Production ended during the Depression. The price of a Memo was about $25, or roughly $400 in today's depreciated dollars.

Universal Mercury II (1946-1952)

The Mercury II was a half-frame 35 mm camera with a unique rotary shutter. About 150,000 were made by Universal Camera Corporation from 1946 through 1952. The list price was $82.90 for the version with an f/2.7 lens.

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Film Chamber

There was a similar Mercury made before WWII. The pre-war Mercury used a proprietary film load made for Universal by Gevaert in Belgium. Film supplies for the original Mercury were interrupted by the German invasion of Belgium in 1940, and the post-war version was redesigned to use the standard 35 mm film cartridges that are readily available from many sources.

The camera body is made from an aluminum-magnesium alloy and has a black synthetic rubber trim. The film winding knob, the shutter speed knob and the advance-rewind switch are on the front. The shutter button, a cable release socket and the film rewind knob are on the top. The top of the camera also has an accessory shoe and a flash shoe. A matching extinction exposure meter and a flash attachment were available. A film reminder and a very complex exposure calculator are on the back. The shutter housing is decorated with depth of field tables. The bottom of the camera has a tripod socket and the button to unlatch the back. The Mercury did not have the advantage of compact size that the Japanese half-frame 35 mm cameras did, the body being nearly the same size as the full frame 35 mm Argus model 21 that came out about the same time.

The lens on my camera is a scale focusing Universal Tricor f/3.5, 35 mm focal length lens that focuses to 1'-9". The lens stops down to f/22. An f/2.0 and an f/2.7 lens also were available. A 1-1/16" push-on Series V filter adapter fits the lens on my camera.

Shutter speeds were 1/1000, 1/300, 1/200, 1/100, 1/60, 1/40, 1/30, 1/20, B (bulb) and T (time). The shutter is synchronized for flash. The shutter is a rotary shutter that works like the shutter on a Hollywood motion picture camera. It has a slit in a rotating disk that spins to let the slit sweep over the film when you press the shutter button. The slit is variable in width, and with the shutter rotating at a fixed speed the size of the slit determines the duration of the exposure. The parking meter hump on the top of the camera is a cover for the shutter. One of the selling points of the Mercury was that the Harvard observatory used a Universal Mercury shutter in a coronagraph because the shutter made more uniform exposures than the other shutters being made at the time. The camera makes a half frame (24 mm x 19 mm) instead of a full frame picture mostly because the shutter would have to be much larger for a full 24 mm by 36 mm picture, making the camera too big. A roll of film that would make 36 pictures in a regular 35 mm camera will make 65 pictures in a Mercury. Winding the shutter advances the film, preventing missed frames and accidental double exposures. It is not possible to make a deliberate double exposure,

The Mercury has a reverse galilean finder that is small and a little hard to use compared to viewfinders in more modern cameras.

The finish on my camera is showing its age, and the shutter speeds have dropped by about half due to age (for example the 1/1000 setting is closer to 1/500), although it will still take a picture. I'd wanted one of these for years, ever since seeing a picture of one, because they are just so odd looking.

Old Chevy

Kodak Signet 40 (1956-1959)

The cameras in the Signet lineup (the 35, 40, 30, 50 and 80) were Kodak's middle 35 mm cameras - nicer than the Kodak Pony, but not as fancy as the Kodak Retina. The Kodak Signet 40 was a less expensive version of the Kodak Signet 35. The 40 was made in Rochester, NY, from 1956 through 1959. The list price in 1956 was $65.00, which had the buying power of about 604 depreciated 2019 dollars.

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Exposure Guide

Exposure Counter and Film Reminder

Cocking Lever, Shutter Speed, Aperture, Distance Scale and Shutter Release

The camera body is plastic with metal fittings. The top has the film advance lever, the film reminder dial, the exposure counter and the rewind crank. The shutter release is on the front. The hinge for the back is on the left. The latch for the back is on the right and the "Kodalite" pin-and-screw fittings for flash are on the left. The rewind and shutter release levers are at the bottom of the back and front. The bottom has a tripod socket a little left of the center. There is a combined viewfinder and rangefinder like the one on the Signet 35.

The lens is a unit focusing, f/3.5-22, 46 mm Kodak Ektanon lens with three elements in three groups, in a Kodak Synchro 400 shutter, and focused as close as 2 feet. The lens has a retaining ring for Series V drop-in filters and attachments.

The shutter speeds on the Synchro 400 are 1/400, 1/200, 1/100, 1/50, 1/25, 1/10 and 1/5 second plus Bulb. It is a set-and-release shutter; advancing the film did not automatically cock the shutter. The shutter release is interlocked with the film advance to prevent double exposures or skipped frames. The release lever permits a deliberate double exposure or lets you try again if the flash bulb failed to go off. A socket for a cable release is provided. When you used a cable release, it bypasses the double exposure prevention system and to advance the film after making an exposure using the cable release you need to press the rewind lever and push the film advance lever once, then release the rewind lever and advance the film normally.


To load film you push down on the latch on the right side of the camera body and open the back. You push up on the rewind crank and drop the film cassette into the compartment on the left, then push down on the rewind crank so the fork engages the key inside the film cassette. You pull the film to the right and insert the leader into the take-up drum so the tooth on the drum catches a perforation on the film. Once the film is on the take-up drum you can close the back. About three pulls on the winding lever advances the film to the next frame, when cocking the shutter will allow you to press the shutter release. After you advance the film to the first frame, you set the exposure counter to the number of pictures on the roll. The exposure counter counts down to zero.

There is a film reminder dial on the right for Tri-X, Panatomic-X, Kodachrome (daylight or artificial light), Plus-X and Ektachrome (daylight or artificial light). The rewind crank has daylight exposure guides for Plus-X (ASA 125), Kodachrome (ASA 10) and Ektachrome (ASA 25) films.

To take a picture you push the lever about three times to advance the film, cock the shutter, check the shutter speed and aperture, focus with the rangefinder and make the exposure. When the roll is used up you press and hold the rewind lever at the lower back of the camera and rewind the film using the rewind crank.

This camera can take a sharp picture.

The Natchez Trace Bridge over Hwy 96, Franklin, Tennessee

Kodak Signet 50

The Kodak Signet 50 basically is the Kodak Signet 30 with a selenium cell exposure meter built in. It was sold from 1957 through 1960 and the original list price of $82.50 in 1957 dollars had the purchasing power of $767 in depreciated 2019 dollars. The succeeding Kodak Automatic 35 had a similar body.

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Exposure Meter

Aperture and Shutter Speed Rings

Exposure Value Ring (f/8 at 1/60 second equals EV 12)

The body was molded resin with metal parts. The film advance lever and the tripod socket are on the bottom. The exposure meter, an accessory shoe and the rewind knob are on the top. A slot for a film reminder card is on the back. Kodak provided for its 35 mm films reminder cards with exposure guides to fit the holder. The exposure counter and the shutter release are on the front. The cable release is on the die of the shutter. A pin-and-screw attachment for a "Kodalite" flasholder is on the side of the camera.

The lens is a three element, coated, f/2.8-22 44 mm Kodak Ektanar lens with front cell focusing. The lens focuses as close as 2.5 feet. The distance scale is marked for zone focusing (Scenes, Groups and Close-up) and distances in feet. The lens has thorium glass and is slightly radioactive. The shutter is a Kodak Synchro 250 shutter with speeds of 1/4, 1/8, 1/15, 1/30, 1/60, 1/125 and 1/250 second plus B (bulb). The shutter speed and aperture settings are interlocked and an EV scale is provided. A depth of field scale is provided.

The selenium cell exposure meter has film speed settings from ASA 10 to 400. The meter readout is in exposure values from 5 to 18. To set the camera to an exposure value you set the shutter speed, then push in the aperture ring and move the red exposure value index mark to the needed exposure value on the scale at the bottom of the lens. In addition to the meter reading you can use exposure values from the exposure guide on a Kodak film card. The card for a given Kodak film can be inserted in the holder on the back of the camera.

The viewfinder has bright frame lines with parallax correction marks for 3 feet and 5 feet distances. The word "wind" appears in the field of view to remind you to advance the film after taking a picture.

The film advance is by a lever on the bottom of the camera. The exposure counter, located on the front of the camera, resets to zero when the back of the camera is opened, and counts up. The rewind knob lifts for rewinding the film. The is a tiny rewind release on the front of the camera, near the exposure counter.

This is a nice, easy to use camera. The viewfinder is very good. The lens is adequate.

New Filters on Old Lenses

Cameras from the era when they actually made 35 mm cameras in the US commonly used drop-in filters, usually Series V (1-3/16" or 30 mm diameter) or Series VI (1-5/8" or 41 mm diameter) size, that fit either an adapter that was slipped on or threaded into the lens, or a retaining ring that was part of the lens. Series V or VI drop-in filters apparently are no longer made. Old filters, especially polarizers, are not always available in good condition. It is possible to use a threaded step-up ring instead of the original threaded insert to attach a modern screw-in filter in place of a drop-in filter. The retaining ring on a Series V adapter has a thread diameter of 1-5/16" (33.3 mm) and a Series VI has 1-3/4" (44.5 mm). A 33.5 mm to 52 mm step-up ring (lens to filter) can replace a Series V insert and a 44 mm to 52 mm step-up ring can replace a Series VI insert. The thread pitch and diameters don't exactly match, but both fit the adapters I have without jamming or being too loose, and let me use the modern 52 mm filters I already have with old cameras. One problem is that on some cameras the edge of the filter intrudes on the field of view of the viewfinder. You can find step rings from on-line sellers like Amazon or B&H Photo. You can find Series adapter rings on eBay.

Adapter ring, original insert and step-up ring

Adapter ring and step-up ring threaded together, ready for a modern filter

Argus Super Seventy-Five (1954-1958)

The Argus Super Seventy-Five is a version of the Argus Seventy-five with a focusing lens, three aperture stops and a single speed shutter. It is similar to a Kodak Duaflex camera with a Kodar lens. Argus made the Super Seventy-Five from 1954 through 1958.  The Super Seventy-Five was a successor to the Argus 40 (https://fourelementsinthreegroups.blogspot.com/2019/02/argus-40-1950-1954.html).

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Exposure Guide

The body of the camera is molded phenolic resin with metal trim and a metal back. The bottom has a tripod socket and an Argus 76 flasholder can plug into the left side. The inside of the viewfinder hood has an exposure guide with camera setting instructions. The body is nearly the same as the Argus 40 and the Argus 75.

The lens is an f/8, front cell focusing triplet with a 65 mm focal length. The closest focusing distance is 3-1/2 ft. The aperture stops are round openings in a revolving plate that can be set only at f/8, f/11 or f/16. You can't set the aperture to intermediate values. The distance scale on the front lens cell is color coded for flash settings. From 6 ft. to 9 ft. you want to set the aperture at f/16 (yellow), from 9 ft. to about 13 ft. f/11 (red) and from about 13 ft. to 18 ft. f/8 (green).

The shutter can be set for "Instantaneous" (about 1/50 of a second) or "Time" (the shutter stays open as long as the shutter button is pressed).

The camera takes twelve 2-1/4" square pictures on size 620 film. The film advance knob is on the right side of the camera. You control the film spacing by looking through the little red window at the numbers on the backing paper. The shutter and film advance are interlocked to prevent you from pressing the shutter button until you have advanced the film.

Argus Seventy-five (1949-1958) and Argus 75 (1959-1964)

The Seventy-five is a simple camera with a fixed focus lens and a single speed shutter. Argus began to make the Argus Seventy-five, a simplified version of the Argoflex EF twin lens reflex camera, in 1949 and continued to produce it until 1958. The Argus 75 has a restyled exterior with the color changed from black to dark brown and a different pattern on the metal trim, but otherwise is the same camera, and was made from 1959 to 1964.

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The body is molded phenolic resin plastic with metal trim and a die-cast metal back. There is a tripod socket on the bottom. An Argus 76 flash gun plugs into the side. The body appears to be nearly the same as the Argus 40 and the Argus Super Seventy-five. A carrying case was available.

The lens is a simple meniscus with a focal length of 75 mm and a fixed aperture of about f/13. Pictures are acceptably sharp with the subject seven or more feet away. A slip-on closeup lens was available for head-and-shoulder portraits from about three or four feet away.

The shutter is a rotary type with a speed of about 1/50 of a second. The shutter is cocked when the film winding knob is turned and a red flag appears behind the lens to tell the photographer that the camera is ready to take a picture. After the picture is taken the red flag disappears to tell you to advance the film. This simple double exposure prevention system eliminates one common amateur mistake, although it is still possible to overlap frames by winding too little, or skip a frame by accidentally winding too far. A small lever near the shutter button lets you switch from "instantaneous" (1/50 second) to "time" (the shutter stays open as long as you press the shutter button).

The viewfinder is a large, bright, waist-level brilliant viewfinder. A brilliant viewfinder has two positive lenses and a mirror, and produces a mirror reversed, but upright, image. A brilliant finder does not show whether the subject is in focus. On a 75 the taking lens sees a wider scene than the viewfinder does. This feature does reduce the chance of cutting off the top of the subject's head in the picture, but you might also get extraneous detail around the edge of the picture that you didn't see in the viewfinder.

The cameras take twelve 2-1/4" square pictures on a roll of Kodak 620 or Agfa PB20 film. You space the pictures on the film by looking through the little red window at the numbers printed on the backing paper. They will work with modern 120 size film if it is re-spooled onto a 620 spool. Size 120 films can't be used as-is with these cameras because the film spools are too big to fit. 620 film is the same as 120 film except for the spool it is wound on, which means you can re-spool a roll of 120 film onto an old 620 spool to use in these cameras. You need to re-spool in total darkness inside a darkroom or inside a film changing bag. For daylight pictures you need to use 100 speed black and white or color film.

The Seventy-fives are similar to the Kodak Duaflex with a Kodet lens, the Ansco Rediflex, the Spartus Full-Vue, and others. These are family snapshot cameras for sunny days outdoors or for flash pictures indoors. The list price in 1950 was $14.89, which was roughly equivalent in buying power to $140 in depreciated 2019 dollars. Old Seventy-fives are fairly easy to take apart and clean. They are so simple mechanically that there isn't much to go wrong.