Eichapfel
B. Eichapfel was a camera maker in Dresden, Germany. The firm is known only for two models of the Noviflex, a rigid, metal-bodied single-lens reflex camera for 6x6 cm exposures on 120 roll film, but this camera is significant, being widely acknowledged (for example by McKeown[1]) as the first 6x6 cm SLR, from 1934. The better-known Reflex Korelle by Kochmann followed in 1935.
The first model has a fixed lens. McKeown lists a wide choice of lenses, all 7.5 cm and mostly f/3.5 or f/2.9, including Victar, Meyer Trioplan or Primotar, and Schnieder Xenar, also available as an f/2. The camera has a cloth focal-plane shutter, travelling horizontally, with speeds 1/20 - 1/1000 second, plus 'B'. The speed control is a knob at the right-hand end of the top plate. The film advance knob is at the other end; winding the film tensions the shutter.[1] The advance knob appears to have a frame counter.[2] There is a red window in the bottom right hand of the back.
The camera has a folding viewfinder hood on top, with a hinged focusing loupe. The example shown by McKeown,[1] and one sold at Westlicht[2] have unit focusing, with a knob on the left side of the lens housing. An example shown at the Hungarian Museum of Photography has an 8 cm f/2.7 Carl Zeiss Jena Tessar, apparently with helical focusing on the lens barrel, though the camera's case has a hole for the focus knob.[3]
McKeown lists a second model of the camera from 1937, with interchangeable lenses (though he only lists a Meyer 15 cm f/5.5 Tele-Megor;[1] a situation similar to the Pilot Super, also offered with several different standard lenses, and just one long-focus lens. At this time, there were no retro-focus lens designs, so there could not be a significant wide-angle on a rigid camera body.
Some cameras have a folding frame finder on top, in addition to the focusing hood. McKeown describes this as a feature of the second model,[1] but both the example at Westlicht and that shown at the Hungarian Museum of Photography have this finder.[2][3] McKeown also describes the second model as having a red window cover, but the example at Westlicht also has this.
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 McKeown, James M. and Joan C. McKeown's Price Guide to Antique and Classic Cameras, 12th Edition, 2005-2006. USA, Centennial Photo Service, 2004. ISBN 0-931838-40-1 (hardcover). ISBN 0-931838-41-X (softcover). p261.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Eichapfel Noviflex, first model, with 7.5 cm f/2.9 Xenar (the lens serial number 1038659 dates the camera to 1936 or 37), sold at the May 2011 Westlicht Photographica Auction in Vienna.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Noviflex with 8 cm f/2.7 CZJ Tessar, at the Hungarian Museum of Photography. The serial number 659762 of the lens dates it (i.e. the lens) to 1925-6.
