Kodak Retina I

The orignal Kodak Retina (type 117) is a historically significant camera, because Kodak introduced the now ubiquitous daylight-loading 135 cartridge for this camera. (Earlier 35mm cameras required manually spooling bulk 35mm cine film into proprietary cassettes.) The design of the Retina borrowed significantly from the 127-film Vollenda which had been manufactured by the August Nagel Camera Works until its purchase and re-christening as Kodak AG.

The Retina I models are distinguished from the II and III series by being scale-focused, rather than using a rangefinder.

The eventual triumph of the 135 format owed much to the acceptance of the Retina as a compact, precision 35mm camera, as well as to the success of lower-priced alternatives such as those manufactured by Argus.

The following is a list of Retina I cameras produced from 1934 to 1940/1941? and 1945 to 1950.

• Typ 117 Retina - 1934 to 1935
• Typ 118 Retina - 1935 to 1936
• Typ 119 Retina I - 1936 to 1938
• Typ 126 Retina I - 1936 to 1937
• Typ 141 Retina I - 1937 to 1939
• Typ 143 Retina I - 1938 to 1939

• Typ 148 Retina I - 1939 to 1940
• Typ 149 Retina I - 1939 to 1940
• Typ 167 Retina I - 1940 - ? 1941
• Kodak AG stopped camera production in the summer of 1941. Plant was requisitioned by German government to make time-fuses.
• First camera parts for post-war production manufactured in July 1945.
• Typ 010 Retina I - November 1945 to June 1949
• Typ 013 Retina I - August 1949 to December 1950

• The Retina camera illustrated top right is a Typ 119 Retina I.
• The Retina camera illustrated bottom right is a late production Typ 148 Retina I.

Links

• Rare Retinas
• Chris Sherlock's Retina collection
• Kodak Retina
• Folding Retina FAQ
• Retina Cameras
• Chris Eve's Kodak Camera collection
• Retinas illustrated
• The Kodak collector's page
• The Retina Guide
• Retina Cameras at Camera Collection by Sylvain Halgand