The Konishiroku Konica III

   It's interesting to note that when World War Two ended in 1945, I was just ten years old.  At that time, my pals and I thought the Japanese lost the war because their airplanes were made of wood; they used bamboo spears instead of rifles; and they had very poor vision and had to wear Coke bottle eyeglasses. Of course, that wasn't true.
  That said, it's even more interesting to note that, while their economy was still recovering from the war just a few years later, Japanese craftsmen were producing the wonderful Canon, Konica, Leotax, Nicca, Yashica, Ricoh, Petri, Minolta, and Aires rangefinder cameras, to name just a few. Shown here is the Konica III, several versions of which were produced from 1956-1958.

    The third Konica RF produced after the Konica I and II, this camera utilizes the traditional, basic layout of controls. In the photo (left) red marks the shutter speed dial (B-1/500); blue denotes the aperture adjustment dial (2.4-22); white shows the adjustable light value scale; yellow shows the focusing dial; black marks the depth of field indicator..
     Not traditional, however, is the double stroke left-hand lever (green), which you depress with your thumb. Designed to allow the photographer to advance the film and cock the shutter without removing the camera from his eye, this certainly is an improvement compared to the earlier Konica I and Konica II.

     In addition to the double-stroke left hand lever, the Konica III has several other interesting features that weren't common in many other cameras at the time. For example, the back swings open for easy film loading. To do so, you twist the D ring to "O" (photo, right)  and push down on a little spring loaded gizmo (just visible near the "O" in the photo). What's more, this unique camera has an f2.4-f22 Hexanon lens. f2.4 you say? Well, I've seen many f2.8 lenses, but I can't recall ever seeing any f2.4 lenses.  Finally, unlike the two earlier models of the Konica III, this one has strap lugs.
     Although the viewfinder on the camera shown here is bright and clear, the rangefinder patch is a bit dim. I suppose that's because because of its age. Even so, I would still recommend the Konica III to any photographer who enjoys shooting film with one of those wonderful old cameras from the '50s.

COMING SOON: The Leidolf Lordomat Standard