OTAG
OTAG (Österreichisches Telefon AG) was a maker of telephones and radio sets in Vienna in the early 20th century.[1] The company is known for only one camera, from about 1925. This was mostly sold as the Amourette, but Collection Appareils shows the same camera (or a very similar one) named the Lutin, and suggests this name was only used in France.[1] This may have been simply a matter of good taste (an 'amourette' is a love affair in French, so perhaps the name was thought indelicate in France, while a lutin is a puck or elf).
The Amourette makes images 31x33 mm[2] on perforated 35 mm film in special cassettes.[3]
The camera has a metal body, D-shaped in plan, with the lens mounted on the curved front, and the back of the camera flat. There is a panel of leather covering around the lens; otherwise the camera is simply painted. The perforated film is passed from a cartridge on the supply side to another on the uptake side, like the later Agfa Rapid system. The film advance mechanism is built into the back plate (the rest of the body, with the lens and shutter, is removed for loading). The film is advanced by pulling a tab at one end of the back.
Some examples have a 35 mm f/6.3 Double Miniscope, or Laack Dialytar (with aperture stops at f/6.3 and f/11.6), and a three-speed everset shutter (1/25 - 1/100 second).[2][4][5] A camera was sold at Westlicht with a Meyer Helioplan 4 cm f/4.5 and a Compur shutter, however.[6]
There is a folding frame-finder on the top of the camera, and it has a tripod bush set in the bottom.
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 OTAG Lutin at Collection Appareils.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 The image size is reported as 31x33 mm in almost all sources, including Collection Appareils and Westlicht, but the Hungarian Photographic Museum shows an Amourette (serial no. 1319), with Double Miniscope and three-speed patent shutter, and gives its image size as 24 mm square.
- ↑ Thurman F. Naylor in his 1980 publication "A New Look at the Old 35" gives the following details: The inventor was Jacques Singer and his patent was applied for on 23 March 1925 and granted on 22nd October 1925. The camera made 50 exposures 24×30mm on unperforated 35mm film and was produced until 1930. The camera pictured has an ExtraRapidoptik 35mm f/6.3 lens and a 3-speed shutter.
- ↑ Amourette serial no. 1993, with 3.5 cm f/6.3 Double Miniscope and three-speed shutter, sold with a metal case and instruction book at the Seventh Westlicht Photographica Auction, in May 2005.
- ↑ Amourette serial no. 1034, with 3.5 cm f/6.3 Laack Dialytar and three-speed shutter, also sold at the Seventh Westlicht auction.
- ↑ Amourette serial no. 5125, with Meyer 4 cm f/4.5 Helioplan and dial-set Compur shutter, sold together with a rather similar and slightly earlier camera, the Photorette, also Austrian, at the 25th Westlicht auction, in March 2014.
