classic cameras

Latest about classic cameras

Rollei B35
The world's most iconic tiny film camera was almost never built

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras The secret history of the Rollei 35: A masterpiece born in a basement

Classic cameras
Sketch of Ilford Witness camera
The lost history of Britain’s most innovative SLRs - and the camera that's rarer than a Stradivarius

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras High quality, high cost – the sorry tale of why Britain’s best cameras couldn't survive the 1960s

Classic cameras
Line drawing of Speed Graphic camera
This 7-pound beast was once the press photographer's favorite camera, before it landed a surprising role in Star Wars

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras From Iwo Jima to Jedi: The surprising history of the Graflex Speed Graphic camera

Classic cameras
Line drawing of the original 1928 Rolleiflex TLR camera
How a trench warfare invention became Germany’s most iconic camera for a whole generation of professional photographers

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras Why the Rolleiflex medium format film camera is still considered one of the finest camera lines ever made

Classic cameras
Yashica Pentamatic
The rise and fall of Yashica cameras: Why the Yashica FX-3 remains the ultimate budget alternative to the Pentax K1000 SLR

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras The Zeiss connection: Why collectors still hunt for Yashica’s C/Y mount camera bodies

Classic cameras
Line drawing of Instax Mini 10
The curious tale of how Fujifilm Instax cameras survived a brutal patent war to become an instant success selling over 100 million cameras!

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras Inside the 80-year rivalry that made the world's favorite instant camera brand possible

Classic cameras
Line drawing of Argus C3
This American-made camera was known as The Brick – but still some two million photographers bought one!

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras The legendary American camera brand you probably forgot ever existed

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Classic cameras
Line drawing of Mamiya C220 camera
The clever engineering trick that made Mamiya's cameras twice as good as its twin-lens reflex rivals

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras Mamiya failed at 35mm cameras, but then it built a legend with this twin-lens reflex range

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Classic cameras
Sony Mavica. This camera doesn't use an ordinary film but a magnetic cassette, the Mavipak, which can record 50 shots, but also erase them and be used over again. New York, 26 October 1981. (Photo by Owen Franken/Sygma via Getty Images)
This "utterly awful" analog camera recorded photos to floppy discs but somehow paved the way for modern digital photography

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras Sony called it the "Magnetic Video Camera" but it didn't actually record video!

Classic cameras
35mm film
The most expensive part of a 35mm film cassette is the part that photographers don't even think about

By David S Young Published

Classic cameras The simple 1934 invention that finally made photography convenient for everyone

Classic cameras
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