Seikosha

Seikosha (精工舎, Seikōsha) is a Japanese company that manufactured shutters. It was founded as the manufacturing branch of Hattori Tokei-ten, to make clocks and watches. It began the production of camera shutters in 1930, but volume production did not start until 1933.

Today it is called Seiko Precision Inc. (セイコープレシジョン株式会社), and still makes camera components, while the watch company separated in 1937 and became Seiko Instruments Inc.

Leaf shutters

• Magna (#0: 1930), inspired by the Vario
• Seikosha (#0: 1932), inspired by the Compur
• Licht (#00: 1935)
• Seikosha-Rapid (#00: 1941, actually sold in 1946; #0: 1952)
• Seikosha-MX (#00: 1955; #0: 1956)
• Seikosha-MXL (#00: 1956)
• Seikosha-SLV (#00: 1958; #0: 1959; #1: 1966)
• Seikosha-SLS (#00, up to 1/1000)

Bibliography

• Kamera no mekanizumu sono I: "Hai! Chīzu" Shunkan o torae-tsuzukeru shattā-ten (カメラのメカニズム・そのⅠ・「ハイ！チーズ」瞬間をとらえ続けるシャッター展, Camera mechanism, part 1 "Cheese!" Exhibition of instant taking shutters). Tokyo: JCII Camera Museum, 2002. (Exhibition catalogue, no ISBN number)

Links

• Page about early Japanese shutters at the JCII Camera Museum website, this page presents the exhibition whose catalogue is listed in the Bibliography section
• Chronology at the Seiko official website