Ilford Sporti
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| Ilford Sporti |
The Sporti series cameras were made by Dacora in Germany, for Ilford from around 1959. There were 120 film versions, taking 6x6cm images on 120 film, and a 127 film model - Sporti 4.
Contents
Sporti
The 120 film Sporti was metal-framed, with a little plastic used in the lens barrel; later versions seem to have had a plastic winding knob in place of the metal one. The back was hinged, and had a central red window. The Sporti was almost identical to the Dacora Digna 1. The shutter speed was fixed, with flash synch, and two apertures - "Sunny" and "Cloudy/Flash". The lens focused from 5ft - infinity, marked into "CLOSE-UPS", "GROUPS" and "VIEWS" zones.
Sporti 4
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| Ilford Sporti 4 in front of a Sporti |
The Sporti 4 was introduced in 1960 and took 4x4cm images on 127 film. The body was mostly plastic, with a metal cap around the lens barrel - and had slightly cleaner lines than the original Sporti. It had a fixed-focus lens with "Sunny" and "Cloudy" apertures, and a single-speed shutter with flash synch.
Sporti 6
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| Ilford Sporti 6 |
In 1963, the Sporti 6 was introduced with an updated look, a two-speed shutter (1/50 & 1/100) and a choice of three apertures, f8,f11,f16. The body was plastic, with a metal face plate around the viewfinder and lens barrel. The entire back and base was removable as a unit for film loading; the base having a hole through it for the tripod bush, which was mounted in the body. Beside the viewfinder was a panel suggesting a light meter, but which actually just contained the Ilford nameplate and a red indicator when winding was required. The shutter would not fire until the film was wound, thus preventing double-exposures. The lens focused from 5ft/1.5m to infinity, with similar zones to the Sporti, except that the "6" has symbols in place of words.
The flash synch PC socket was behind the speed selector ring, which had a cut-out which lined up with the socket when set to the flash sync speed of 1/50, thus ensuring the correct speed was selected when the flash was connected.
Compared to the original Sporti,the "6" was much lighter and about 1cm shorter in height.
Links
- Sporti, Sporti 4 and Sporti 6 at Maurice Fisher's
- Sporti 4 at onetwoseven.org [1]
- Sporti 4 instruction manual on Maurice Fisher's site
- Sporti 6 instruction manual on Maurice Fisher's site
