Unitas
The Unitas[1] is a metal-bodied camera for exposures 24x30mm on 35mm film loaded in a special cassette, made just after the Second World War by Alexander Zsigmond in Vienna.[2] The body of the camera is a simple metal box, rectangular with rounded corners, and with a hinged door at the back. It is covered with a black crackle-finish, with a chromium- (or nickel-) plated edge around the door. 'Unitas' is embossed in the metal of the door, and there is a round 'AZ' logo painted on the lens-plate. It has a 4.2 cm f/8 'Unitar' lens, with front-element focusing down to 0.5 metre, and no aperture adjustment. It has a two-bladed shutter with speeds 1/25, 1/50, 1/100 and 'Z' (presumably 'B' shutter). The shutter button is a plunger on the left side of the camera. On the example cited, this is black, but is bright plated metal on other examples.
There is a folding metal frame-finder on the top, and a winding knob with a frame-number window next to it. Some examples also have a knurled knob next to this, which might be an adjuster for the frame-counter.
The Unitas is the only still camera Zsigmond is known to have made. He also made a wooden-bodied cine camera, the Zenit,[3] and wrote and directed a film, 'Madame Blaubart' (Madame Bluebeard).[4][5]
Notes
- ↑ The camera is referred to in many places as the Vienna Unitas, but only 'Unitas' appears on the camera,
- ↑ Unitas camera offered for sale at the 32nd Westlicht Photographica Auction, in March 2018. Good pictures of several views of the camera, including inside, showing a film cassette and the rear of the shutter.
- ↑ blog post, Neue Kooperation mit dem Österreichischen Filmmuseum (new collaboration with the Austrian Film Museum), at Medientheorie, a blog of the Universität für angewandte Kunst Wien (University of Applied Arts, Vienna): one photo of the cine camera.
- ↑ Madame Blaubart listing at IMDB.
- ↑ Poster for the Hungarian release of Madame Blaubart, in the collection of Central St Martins School of Art & Design.
