Continued from Part 1 The early 1980s saw two major changes for Contax: in 1983 Kyocera Corporation acquired the Yashica company. Kyocera is an industrial conglomerate with a very diversified product palette ranging from industrial ceramics (which gave the Kyoto-based company its name), to audio components, photo copiers and laser printers, solar cells,... 

When the E. Leitz Company introduced the first practical 35mm camera in 1925, it was an instant world-wide sensation. The Leitz Camera — Leica –, paved the way for a completely new way of creating photographs. At that time the Carl Zeiss Foundation of Jena, Germany, was already a well-established company with almost 50 years of optical history... 

Sankyo Camera Co.'s Hiroatsu “Hero” Akizawa photographed by Barry Kawa Text and images by Barry Kawa for Japan Exposures At most train stations in Tokyo, there are still film stores that can develop a roll of film in 45 minutes or less, so you can stop back and pick up your pictures on the way through, and enjoy looking at them on your train... 

Text and images by Barry Kawa for Japan Exposures Recently, a young Japanese woman brought in an old shiny camera to my office, a curious look on her face. It was her grandfather’s 1950s Konica IIA, a rangefinder. She said her grandmother had wanted her to have it, an old antique that her grandfather, who had passed away recently, had loved using. The... 

This ad for Fujifilm’s Fujica 35 Auto-M is from the back cover of the April, 1962 issue of Asahi Camera, and was “on sale now” as the red lettering says in the top left corner. The tag line plays up its magical quality by telling us “You don’t need to touch either the aperture ring or the shutter speed dial.” (Literally,...