Clack
The Clack camera was manufactured by Agfa 1954-65. Earlier models had a metal body. Later ones were made of plastic. It is a simple, box like camera. It had a single element 95mm meniscus lens with built in close up filter and yellow filter. It takes 6×9 cm pictures on 120 Roll Film.
Intelligent solutions
To enable this camera to take quality pictures with such a simple lens, it is always stopped down to f/11 ot further. The large negative size allows contact prints of an acceptable size. When enlarged, they don't need to be enlarged by great factors. Best feature of all is the curved film plane. There's no pressure plate in the back of the camera, the film isn't supposed to be flattened. As is visible in the pictures, the camera body is oval shaped. The film is led around the curved back of the camera to create maximum sharpness. An intelligent solution to create a low cost, decent quality camera.
More data:
- Aperture f/11 and f/12.5
- Shutter about 1/30 plus B
- Built in yellow filter
Zone focusing with two steps:
- 1-3m (3-10 feet) with a built-in close up lens.
- 3m (10 feet)-infinity with just an aperture ring between the lens and the film
A useable camera
The Clack is a light viewfinder camera, originally designed for 50 speed B&W film. Most negatives were contact printed. The Agfa Clack works great with 50 speed slide films like Velvia, so use it while you can still get that film. Black and White 50 speed films, and overexposing 100 speed color negative by one stop ought to be fine.
Loading the camera
To change the film, use the bottom screw. Two arrows and a text in German and English show how to open the camera. The bottom and most all sides save the lensboard come off. The pictures shows the bottom screw and some of the imitation lizard skin that covers the body.
