Which fixed lens rangefinder style camera.....

LeeRatters

LeeRatters

Suspended / Banned
Messages
7,354
Name
Lee
Edit My Images
Yes
Hi all.

I am thinking of a fixed lens film camera.

The QL17 and Yashica Electro 35 seem to be the pretty obvious ones. The Olympus Trip 35 also appears to be in the style I would like.

I want to be using it for street so ideally need at least 1/250th shutter and control over the shutter - which feels a weird thing to say as digital I shoot in Av mode most of the time! :)

Ideally around 35mm focal length too but I know some of the above are narrower than that.

I currently use my X100f (35mm equiv) and my Yashica FX3 with a 28mm - I could keep using the FX3 but it's bulkier and noisier than I'd like being an SLR.

Any opinions or further suggestions please?

TIA :)
 
Check out Rank-Mamiya also called Rank-Aldis and other variants dependent on the market. It comes in various forms, but most of the less expensive models have a non coupled selenium meter. Later models have battery operated metering and some are automatic AE. I have only used the selenium type of manual metering.

Plus points include a very neat, strong body, Mamiya Sekor (sometimes Kominor) 40mm four element lens, very good rangefinder image in the clear viewfinder and a good and quiet Seiko based Copal leaf shutter. The apertures run from f2.8 to f22 with a diamond shaped four blade mechanism. I have had one for over thirty years and cannot praise it highly enough.

photothinking.com

Rank Mamiya – What’s in a name? - Photo Thinking

A review of the Rank Mamiya, also known as the Mamiya Ruby or 4B. It is a rangefinder camera from the 60's with an unfortunate name. - Photo Thinking
photothinking.com photothinking.com
 
LeeRatters said:
Hi all.

I am thinking of a fixed lens film camera.

The QL17 and Yashica Electro 35 seem to be the pretty obvious ones. The Olympus Trip 35 also appears to be in the style I would like.

I want to be using it for street so ideally need at least 1/250th shutter and control over the shutter - which feels a weird thing to say as digital I shoot in Av mode most of the time! :)

Ideally around 35mm focal length too but I know some of the above are narrower than that.

I currently use my X100f (35mm equiv) and my Yashica FX3 with a 28mm - I could keep using the FX3 but it's bulkier and noisier than I'd like being an SLR.

Any opinions or further suggestions please?

TIA :)
Click to expand...

The Olympus Trip 35 is great, and the lens is superb, but it's not a rangefinder per-se; it's zone focus. Still worth having though - it's my go to holiday film camera now.

The Olympus 35 RC, 35 RD, and 35 SP (or the Later Olympus XA) are all proper rangefinders. I have the 35 RC and that's a nice little camera too. It and (definitely) the XA might be considered pocketable, but I think the RD and SP are a little larger.
 
Do you actually want a range finder, or something in that style? Funnily enough Clive took the words right out of my mouth. I was going to say the exact same thing.
 
LeeRatters said:
Hi all.

I am thinking of a fixed lens film camera.

The QL17 and Yashica Electro 35 seem to be the pretty obvious ones. The Olympus Trip 35 also appears to be in the style I would like.

I want to be using it for street so ideally need at least 1/250th shutter and control over the shutter - which feels a weird thing to say as digital I shoot in Av mode most of the time! :)

Ideally around 35mm focal length too but I know some of the above are narrower than that.

I currently use my X100f (35mm equiv) and my Yashica FX3 with a 28mm - I could keep using the FX3 but it's bulkier and noisier than I'd like being an SLR.

Any opinions or further suggestions please?

TIA :)
Click to expand...

You do know the trip 35 is 40mm? Also, not sure it can do 1/250 can it? I liked mine as it seemed like a slightly better Kodak Instamatic. I had a QL too. I think they're quite different cameras but maybe belong on the same list but with the trip you're stuck with zone and although that might be fine most of the time especially with smaller prints would you be annoyed by the zone only? f2.8 max too, no shallow dof pictures, probably a good thing :D With the QL I suppose you get the RF experience but of these two (I know nothing about the Yashika) maybe the Trip and zone would suit you better for this use assuming you can control your distance to the subject and not get too worried about hyper accurate focus.

Good luck.
 
Clive K said:
Check out Rank-Mamiya also called Rank-Aldis and other variants dependent on the market. It comes in various forms, but most of the less expensive models have a non coupled selenium meter. Later models have battery operated metering and some are automatic AE. I have only used the selenium type of manual metering.

Plus points include a very neat, strong body, Mamiya Sekor (sometimes Kominor) 40mm four element lens, very good rangefinder image in the clear viewfinder and a good and quiet Seiko based Copal leaf shutter. The apertures run from f2.8 to f22 with a diamond shaped four blade mechanism. I have had one for over thirty years and cannot praise it highly enough.

photothinking.com

Rank Mamiya – What’s in a name? - Photo Thinking

A review of the Rank Mamiya, also known as the Mamiya Ruby or 4B. It is a rangefinder camera from the 60's with an unfortunate name. - Photo Thinking
photothinking.com photothinking.com
Click to expand...

Plain Nev said:
Do you actually want a range finder, or something in that style? Funnily enough Clive took the words right out of my mouth. I was going to say the exact same thing.
Click to expand...

Well, I said rangefinder style because I don't want a P&S or another SLR. Actual rangefinder or zone would work for street.

Those Rank-Mamiya at least seem to be a very good price compared to the QL17 & Electro at least. I'll have to do more research.
 
FishyFish said:
The Olympus Trip 35 is great, and the lens is superb, but it's not a rangefinder per-se; it's zone focus. Still worth having though - it's my go to holiday film camera now.

The Olympus 35 RC, 35 RD, and 35 SP (or the Later Olympus XA) are all proper rangefinders. I have the 35 RC and that's a nice little camera too. It and (definitely) the XA might be considered pocketable, but I think the RD and SP are a little larger.
Click to expand...

It's months of looking at your Trip 35 holiday photos that keeps putting these thoughts in my head :ROFLMAO:

The FX3 really does what I need it to do. But you can certainly hear the mirror pretty loud - well, it sounds loud to me at least!
 
woof woof said:
You do know the trip 35 is 40mm? Also, not sure it can do 1/250 can it? I liked mine as it seemed like a slightly better Kodak Instamatic. I had a QL too. I think they're quite different cameras but maybe belong on the same list but with the trip you're stuck with zone and although that might be fine most of the time especially with smaller prints would you be annoyed by the zone only? f2.8 max too, no shallow dof pictures, probably a good thing :D With the QL I suppose you get the RF experience but of these two (I know nothing about the Yashika) maybe the Trip and zone would suit you better for this use assuming you can control your distance to the subject and not get too worried about hyper accurate focus.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

Yes. The QL17 is 40mm too. And I think the Electro 35 is 42 or 45mm. I think the Yashica is a closer match to the Canon and that's the two I have been looking at, on and off. I just wondered if they were the best choices.
 
I'm sure you know the + and - points of RF and zone focusing. RF's can be nice to use and you can always go zone with one but you can't focus a Trip by turning a dial. I think I'd go for the Trip because it's a bit odd and I remember David Bailey ducking and diving about in the ad :D
 
LeeRatters said:
Well, I said rangefinder style because I don't want a P&S or another SLR. Actual rangefinder or zone would work for street.

Those Rank-Mamiya at least seem to be a very good price compared to the QL17 & Electro at least. I'll have to do more research.
Click to expand...

I think they are probably overlooked because the name doesn't trip off the tongue like that of a Canon, or Yashica. I'm not sure, but I always assumed that Rank was tied in with the old British film studio days.
 
My favourite is a Voigtlander Vito Bx, avoiding the models with the shutter release on the front of the camera.

My most often used one is a Vito BR. (very hard to find)

They are small, but not as light as most Japanese similar cameras.. There are two versions of the B, one is slightly smaller (you can see the difference by the size of the viewfinder).

Only problem I have come across is the shutter systems need cleaning, which is easily seen by slow shutter speeds sticking and/or the self timer not working smoothly or at all.
(very easy to fix it that way inclined).

Nice to use and will outlast the user :)
 
The Rank-Mamiya was indeed linked to J Arthur's company as distributer in the UK. They can be found on the American market branded as Ruby and in Germany they were branded Revue. Interesting the reference to Voigtlander as the German companies struggled to match the Japanese for quality at the same price. Some of the Vito models only had a few shutter speeds.

I also have an Olympus XA that is a fantastic camera. But the rangefinder image is quite small and better suited to static subjects. Also, you can't determine the shutter speed. The R-M is more like an older Leica with a built in light meter.
 
I’ve never used one, but something like a Vivitar 35ES may be a good fit for you. Auto exposure (measured within the lens area so you can use filters) and selectable shutter speed up to 1/500; manual wind-on; fast 40mm f1.7 lens; small and discreet.

There are a few other names for this camera as it was sold under various brands, but the Vivitar brand isn’t particularly fashionable, so it’s likely to be cheaper.

My perfect ‘walking around a city’, hiking or ‘throw it in a bag just in case’ camera is still my XA2. It’s incredibly light, small and discreet, with a superbly sharp lens and auto-exposure that seems to nail it every time. For what it’s worth, I’ve owned an XA, Hexar AF, Leica M2, Contax G1 & G2, and loads of other over-hyped, fancy cameras, but sold them all and kept the XA2.

Edit: I do still miss that lovely Hexar lens :-)
 
Last edited:
erm it seems most rangefinder cameras take old mercury batteries and you take a gamble (for electrics) that it doesn't mind if you use a sr44......on google search "what rangefinder camera takes sr44 battery" and it came up with Canon datematic rangefinder camera........but it seems a point and shoot camera.

​

 
The compact rangefinder market of the time was very competitive with all the well knowns competing at similar feature and technology points, the also rans were at the same party and not so brand desirable but of very similar quality. I would just look around and see what is available and fits your features wish list and not be too concerned if it is a GAF or a Mamiya or some other less 'desirable' brand, after forty years the condition of camera and lens will be more important than perceived value.

That said I would defiantly avoid the Rollei T / S collapsible lens cameras from a personal bias and some of the Agfa cameras which used a variant of 35mm called Rapide (Sp.?) that is incompatible with standard 35mm film.

A final thought : Now is probably a good time to be looking as I have a feeling that the newer batch of 35mm zone focus or auto focus cameras from Lomo and Kodak have taken a bit of heat out of the vintage RF market, there are still some dealers and private sellers who are pricing high but I do think they are more noticeably optimistic.
 
Another one to throw into the mix is the Ricoh 500 G. That has auto and manual functions and was highly thought of in its day. Also, unlike most auto rangefinders the Ricoh has shutter priority auto as well as manual. It takes LR44 batteries and the meter performs ok. Even without power it can be used in manual mode.

The downside is that the controls are crammed onto the lens barrel and the viewfinder is tiny.
 
Last edited:
The lomo MC-A if it worked properly would actually do the job. You can set it on MF and use zone instead of the in built AF system. It's got reasonable exposure control as well. Usability and durability don't seem to have been sorted yet.
 
If your fingers are small enough and you can cope with estimating distance, the Minox 35GT has a 35mm f2.8 lens and is absolutely pocketable.

www.35mmc.com

Minox 35 GT review - a true pocket camera - by Gaston W

The advantages of the Minox 35 GT is its size & the decent lens. You could get cleaner shots with a big camera, but you can carry this camera every day?
www.35mmc.com www.35mmc.com
 
I've tried out quite a few small 35mm cameras and the one I found most useful was the Rollie 35B.

It's simple and fast to use, even a chrome model is inconspicuous and the results are good. An example...

Rollei 35B 1991 44-20.jpg

I also tried a 35S but I found it too complicated for its size.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top