Matonox

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The Matonox is a 'night camera' made only as a prototype by Goerz of Berlin in 1925, shortly after Ernemann's Ermanox, and shortly before both Goerz and Ernemann were combined in the merger creating Zeiss Ikon. It is a simple 35mm camera body with a shoe-mounted viewfinder, which serves a 3-inch f/2 lens, the Photomaton. The only known example of the camera (numbered 42) was sold at the 35th Leitz Auction. The body is very simple; metal, with leather covering, winding knobs and advance sprockets, but no frame counter (it is not even clear the advance is auto-stopping). The lens is mounted in a dial-set Ilex 'General' everset shutter (the dial of which appears to obstruct the viewfinder), on a helical focusing mount, awkward to use behind the shutter body. Yet the finder is engraved (in English) as for that specific camera (with the camera's serial number).

Japanese collector 'Spiral' argues convincingly that the lens was made by Bausch & Lomb (owners of Ilex), and shows a copy engraved for them (and some photographs taken with it, mounted on a Sony α7 mirrorless). His blog-post, system-translated:
The lens was supplied by Bausch & Lomb!!!
Bausch and Lomb PHOTOMATON 75mm(3inch) F2
The Photomaton 75mm F2 introduced here is a lens that was installed in a 35mm camera called the Matonox Night-Camera, which was prototyped by the German company C.P. Goerz around 1925 [1]. The company ceased to exist in 1926 when it merged with Ica, Ernemann, and Contessa-Nettel to form Zeiss Ikon, so this camera was never released. The PHOTOMATON installed in the actual Matonox Night-Camera did not have a manufacturer's name written on it, and it was thought that the lens was developed by C.P.Goerz, just like the camera, but what was puzzling was that the shutter was supplied by the American company ILEX, not the German company Deckel, and Goerz did not hold the patent to produce F2-class bright lenses in-house. The camera and lens were developed to compete with Ernemann's Ermanox (lens was Ernostar), which at the time made it possible to take handheld shots at night and shocked the world of news photography.
One day, a breakthrough was made to the mystery of this camera. A friend of mine told me about the existence of a Photomaton with the Bausch and Lomb stamp, and I was able to borrow it from him. ILEX is a shutter manufacturer that was derived from Bausch and Lomb, and this is likely the company that created it. The lens, along with the shutter, had been developed in the United States.
The lens I borrowed this time was obtained by an acquaintance from eBay as a stand-alone lens, and the camera was not included. Afterwards, it was modified so that it could be mounted on a straight helicoid and used as an M42 lens. There was no mold or cloudiness on the lens, and it was in good condition and ready for immediate use. The lens construction is a speedic type with 4 elements in 4 groups, which Lee devised in 1924 as an evolution from the 3-element triplet (see image below). Although it does not have a very good reputation in terms of aberrations, it is characterized by brightness and three-dimensional image creation, and its advantage is that it can maintain a long back focus, and this design configuration was actively adopted by the German company Astro for its high-end cinema lenses. There is no doubt that this is an extremely valuable lens.

Other examples of the lens have been seen.

Links

• At Worthpoint:
  • Photomaton without name-ring or serial number;
  • Photomaton with name-ring and serial no. 3231213 and numbered '899' on the shutter body;
• Photomaton serial no. 751647 at Early Photography.