Rokkor

Rokkor was the brand name Chiyoda Kōgaku Seikō and subsequently Minolta used for its camera lenses. The great majority of these lenses only fitted the company's own manual-focus 35mm SLR camera bodies or compatible products like those of Seagull. Others were part of fixed-lens cameras. Chiyoda also made Rokkor lenses for its Leica-thread-mount rangefinder cameras; these lenses may of course be used on Canon, Cosina Voigtländer, Leitz and other Leica Thread Mount cameras.

The name Rokkor is derived from Mount Rokkō (六甲), a mountain near Osaka that could be seen from Chiyoda's Mukogawa factory; it was probably also inspired by the name Nikkor used by Nippon Kōgaku from 1932. It appeared for the first time in 1940 on the 200/4.5 lens of the SK Type 100 handheld aerial photography camera (百式小型航空写真機SK). The first civilian camera equipped with a Rokkor was the Semi Minolta III, with a 75/3.5 lens that also happens to be the first Japanese coated lens commercially available. However, a Semi Minolta II has been observed with the Rokkor 75/3.5 lens, see the discussion in the corresponding page.

Rokkor lenses for 35mm cameras

image by Haar Fager (Image rights)

Until the year 1981, when Minolta introduced its new corporate design and dropped the name Rokkor, all 35mm cameras where equipped with Rokkor lenses. These can be distinguished in 6 categories:

• Most important the interchangeable lenses in SR mount for the manual SLR system. Even the lenses built after 1981, which had no Rokkor designation (e.g "MD 50mm 1:2") are often called "Rokkors" by people. The focal length range reached from 7.5mm up to 1600mm and there were more than 40 lenses to choose from. In 1978 one of the first Rokkor zoom lenses was derived from a Leitz lens.

• There was a small number of Rokkor lenses for the rangefinder cameras Leitz Minolta CL and Minolta CLE in Leica M mount.

• The Minolta 35, a Leica copy used interchangeable Leica-thread-mount 'Super Rokkor' lenses.

• The Minolta Super A featured interchangeable special bayonet-mount lenses, also marked 'Super Rokkor'.

• All rangefinder cameras and viewfinder cameras like those of the Minolta Hi-Matic series had a Rokkor lens built in.

• The fixed lens SLR Minolta ER had a fixed Rokkor standard lens with wide angle and telephoto auxiliary lens attachments.

Rokkor lenses for medium format cameras

• 75/3.5, coated, equipped the Semi Minolta III
• Minolta Autocord with Rokkor 1:3.2 75mm lens pair

Rokkor lens for large format cameras

• 21cm f/4.5 barrel lens, black finish, aperture from 4.5 to 64

Rokkor 21cm f/4.5 lens no.1100002. Picture by J. Berard. (Image rights)

Rokkor lenses for aerial cameras

These lenses were mounted on the SK-100 aerial camera:

• 200/4.5
• 40cm f/5.6 Boen Rokkor (Boen is normally written 望遠 and means Tele)
• 500/5.6

An uncoated lens engraved Chiyoko E. Rokkor 3,5/75 mm has been reported on a Konishiroku GSK-99 aerial camera. It is probably an enlarging lens fitted to the camera as a posterior modification.

Rokkor lenses for other cameras

• The subminiature cameras of the Minolta 16 had special built-in miniature Rokkors.
• The Minolta 110 Zoom SLRs had built-in Rokkor zoom lenses.
• The Autopak series of cameras for the cassette film types 126 film and 110 pocket film got miniature Rokkor lenses too.

Bibliography

• Ema Hiroshi (江間宏). "Rokkōru renzu no hanashi" (ロッコールレンズの話, Rokkor lens stories). Kamera Rebyū: Kurashikku Kamera Senka (カメラレビュー クラシックカメラ専科) / Camera Review: All about Historical Cameras no.12, October 1988. No ISBN number. Minoruta kamera no subete (ミノルタカメラのすべて, special issue on Minolta). Pp.90–3.
• Francesch, Dominique and Jean-Paul. Histoire de l'appareil photographique Minolta de 1929 à 1985. Paris: Dessain et Tolra, 1985. ISBN 2-249-27685-4.

Links

In images:

• images made with Rokkor lenses on Flickr

In English:

• Minolta lenses in Robeck's Web
• Rokkor 21cm f/4.5 lens, lot no.723 of auction no.6 (6 November 2004) by Westlicht Photographica Auction

In German:

• Rokkor Blog by Dennis Lohmann

In Japanese:

• Minolta 35mm SLR lenses in the Minoltan website

In Korean:

• Rokkor Club lens information