Walz

Walz was a Japanese camera maker or distributor. It was founded in Dec. 1952, and its full name as it appeared in period ads was K.K. Walz Shōkai (株式会社ワルツ商会). Shōkai literally means "Company" in Japanese, but it is most often used for trading companies, and this looks like a distributor's name. It does not mean however that it did not have its own manufacturing branch.

Walz sold cameras under its own name and was also an Olympus agent, at least in 1954. It went bankrupt in April 1961, according to The History of the Japanese Camera.

Walz also sold many accessories, including filters, selftimers, exposure meters, rangefinders, multifocal finders (including a copy of the Leitz Imarect), flash units, movie editors, etc.

The first camera observed with the name Walz appeared in a December 1936 issue of Asahi Camera. It was simply called Walz, and the company name given was Walz Camera Works (ワルツカメラ・ウオークス). In the 16/6/1937 issue of Asahi Graph there was another ad (visible in this page) with two company names: Walz Works and Nihon Shōkai (literally "ワルツウオークス製・日本商會", "Made by Walz Works, Nihon Shōkai"). This would indicate that Walz Works was the maker and Nihon Shōkai was the distributor. The camera pictured in the ads is a strut folder for 127 film (apparently 3×4cm format), with a small tubular optical finder on top. Walz is engraved in the front plate and embossed in the front leather. It has a 50mm f4.5 Walz lens and shutter speeds of 1/25 – 1/100 as well as T and B. Shōwa 10–40nen kōkoku ni miru kokusan kamera no rekishi (see below) identifies Walz Camera Works as Okada Kōgaku (which it also describes as the manufacturer of the 1942 Waltax, although not of any of the various postwar Waltax models). It is certainly the same camera that is listed in McKeown as the "Walz Baby" under the Okada entry.

Note: A post at a Japanese forum indicates that Walz's president was Ōta Toshio (太田俊夫), and that he wrote a novel titled Keikaku Tōsan (計画倒産, Fake Bankruptcy) about the business world of the time.

120 film cameras

4.5×6 folder

• Walcon

6×6 folder

• Walcon 6

6×6 TLR

• Wagoflex
• Walzflex, various models

127 film cameras

• Walz (original)
• Walz Automat 44

35mm film cameras

• Walz 35
• Walz 35-S
• Walz Electric
• Walz Envoy 35
• Walz Envoy M-35
• Walz Wide

References / further reading

• Asahi Camera (アサヒカメラ) editorial staff. Shōwa 10–40nen kōkoku ni miru kokusan kamera no rekishi (昭和10〜40年広告にみる国産カメラの歴史, Japanese camera history as seen in advertisements, 1935–1965). Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1994. ISBN 4-02-330312-7
• Lewis, Gordon, ed. The History of the Japanese Camera. Rochester, N.Y.: George Eastman House, International Museum of Photography & Film, 1991. ISBN 0-935398-17-1 (paper) ISBN 0-935398-16-3 (hard)

Links

In English:

• A post by Peter Evans at photo.net and another one by J Hopper both discuss Walz, Okada, Waltax, Walcon and so on (to be explored)
• The Walz Envoy 35 page, in English and in Japanese at Mediajoy Classic Cameras, follow the "Next" links at bottom of the page to get an illustrated sequence of operations.

In Japanese:

• The Walz 35, the Walz Envoy 35 and the Walz Electric 2.8, all with sample pictures and some with restore tips, at K.Fukushi's Rangefinder website
• A-Z 35mm rangefinder cameras at Asacame, with the Walz Wide on this page
• The Walz 35 page in the Camera database of the Center of the History of Japanese Industrial Technology
• Japanese postwar ads, mostly from 1954, including an ad (posted 2005/08/04) for the Walcon and Walzflex, also stating that Walz was an Olympus agent
• Prewar Japanese ads, including one for the original Walz
• The history page of the coffee company Waltz (ワルツ株式会社), that is apparently an offshoot of Walz Shōkai. This page gives the Dec. 1952 founding date.
• This Walzflex page at La Chambre Claire suggests that Nihon Shōkai was the owner of the Walz brand name before the war, and became Walz Shōkai after the war.