Please recommend 50 Vintage Cameras I should Collect

[Kent T]

I would add a caution on those old Voigtlander rangefinders. They come with a choice of lenses, and even the lesser ones make good pictures, but be aware that the same model camera can have different grades of lens. The other thing about them, and one that requires a firm ability to return a bad one, is that the rangefinder is made with a glued-together block of elements, and if dropped that block can come apart. When that happens, the rangefinder will never be accurate again. The camera will still work, but it's essentially not worth trying to repair. If you get a good one and don't drop it or break it, you will be happy with the camera. The "color Skopar" is the better grade of lens. I can't remember the others, but I think the lesser one was a Lanthar, and there was a superior one that's scarce as hens' teeth.

 

The Vito is a sweet little camera, but you should be aware that its odd winding mechanism means you cannot dry fire it. This may work in your favor if someone has one and thinks it's broken. To test it without film, you must open the back and use the film sprocket to cock the shutter.

 

Some of these models had a coupled selenium meter, and surprisingly, at least on the ones I've used, that meter tends to be accurate.

 

That lens would be a Ultron. I like the Voigtlander RF cameras a lot when working well.

[Glenn McCreery]

For Nikon collectors, an early Nikonos, with its pry-apart clam-shell opening, would be a good addition.

[Glenn McCreery]

Also a Calypso underwater camera, which was conceived of by Jaques Cousteau, manufactured in France, and was the forerunner of the Nikonos.

 

And, don't forget a Nikonos RS, an exotic and expensive 35mm film auto-focus underwater SLR with motor drive. You may be able to find one that has been drowned, but looks good, for a reasonable price.

 

" ...Nikon has stunned the entire photo community by introducing the world's first TTL autofocus reflex-type underwater camera in January, 1992. It is not just another Nikonos, but can be considered as an entirely new breed of underwater camera as it embodied with almost similar performance of a top grade land-based SLR type and made handling photography underwater easily and assuring as with any of the normal Nikon SLRs. Built with cast aluminum chassis, although bulky in dimension and heavy in weight (2.6kg), but it is a robustly built, rugged camera, A built-in motor driven film transport eliminates any need of manual film advance as with the older Nikonos versions (it handles Auto film loading, auto DX or manual film speed coding, power film rewind is also provided); the AF provides various Focusing Modes which includes Single Servo, Continuous, Freeze Focus, or you can revert back to power manual focus (match needled manual focus), an AF lock is also provided; the oversized finder is a high eye point type, permits the diver to view all the essential information (In focus indication, f stop and shutter speed, exposure compensation, and flash ready indications etc.) even with their mask on for true, direct TTL reflex viewing and compositions."

Edited September 21, 2022 by Glenn McCreery

[Kent T]

Favorite collectable cameras, German edition:

 

Leica IIIf

Kodak Retina IIIc

Rollei 35

Rolleiflex Automat 3.5

Zeiss Super Ikonta B

Voigtlander Vitesse

[bruce_z._li2]

For Nikon collectors, an early Nikonos, with its pry-apart clam-shell opening, would be a good addition.[ATTACH=full]1439941[/ATTACH]

 

Even though I have the later Nikonos V, I do agree the older versions of Nikonos/Calypso have their unique aesthetic appeal!

[david_carroll4]

I went with a theme - "Pro" SLRs from the 60s-80s. I loosely defined "Pro" as having an interchangeable finder. My timing was fortuitous - in the mid-'00s, people were offloading their film outfits in favor of digital, so I could pick up good stuff cheap locally on Craigslist, clean it up as necessary and sell the individual items nationally and internationally on eBay, keeping some of the "good stuff" for myself. I ended up 4 Fs, 2 F2s, an F3HP/MD4 and an F4S, FE, Nikonos V, Canon F-1 (first model), Minolta XK, Contax 137MA. The two I never acquired were a New F-1 and an XK Motor (holy grail, IMO). I already had an OM1 and OM4T as my "personal cameras. One each of the F and F2 had less common non-metering heads, and the F3 and F4 each had a full set of heads. I also acquired a stack of Nikkor, FD and Rokkor primes (and upped my Zuiko game), so I could use a standard 24/28, 35, 50, 85/105 and 180/200 kit with each SLR. The fun part for me was researching each item so I could write the most informative blurb for eBay listings, and cleaning up the cameras (replacing seals, mirror bumpers etc) so each worked well. I more than broke even $-wise, not even counting the hardware I acquired along the way. It was a lot of fun while I did it, although after a number of years, I offloaded the lot to finance an OM-D outfit. Although I had a darkroom, the time and expense of film was just becoming unsustainable and all these beautiful beasts just weren't getting used. To this day, I still regret selling the F3HP and OM4T outfits, but much as I'd love to have them, I can't see myself ever shooting film again