No-name cameras
| ||
Cameras are sometimes encountered whose original name badge has come off due to poor adhesive; but a rather smaller group of cameras includes those which actually left the factory with no manufacturer or distributor name attached.
Typically these will be models where an identical branded version exists, but with the name left off for a variety of reasons. Perhaps use of the name is temporarily suspended due to a trademark dispute. Cameras made for export might be left unlabeled to give their foreign resellers flexibility in applying different brands. There may be cases where the origins of a camera are obfuscated to avoid negative associations—the Kiev rangefinder built in Ukraine could plausibly be a Contax instead. Or cameras made in small batches as prototypes or samples may eventually filter out to the collector market.
Camera-wiki.org has noted a number of these models, and surely there are other more obscure ones:
- Early cameras from the wood & brass era may lack identification of their makers
- Korelle_(3x4) 1930s
- Pontiac Bakélite c.1939
- Baldini c.1950
- Contax D/"no-name" Pentacon c.1952
- Akarelle 1960–62
- "No-name" Kiev c.1963
- No-name "Pentax K1000" c.1991
- "35mm Focus Free" (among many Chinese cheapies)
