This is a new section specifically created for rangefinder system users. I guess users of RF bodies/lenses users have a distinctive taste in their own. Most of all, they are a mix of collectors, photographers, historian etc. who may be having keen interest in the photographic equipment produced during the old days. But I guess most of allm, they are the elite group who are more to appreciative the excellence of mechanical / optical engineering presenting in the rangefinder system made during the older days. As it is rather hard to satisfy everyone intention when it relates to a website as each may have their own preferences on brands or types. Over the years, I have constructed quite a number of sites featuring a series of selective camera models and/or optics but they were all related to Single lens reflex (SLR) systems but not really focused on the rangefinder system yet. So,m technically, the RF-Nikon/Nikkor section is my first attempt. When I first started the site, I simply felt it is so unfair just to concentrate on the Nikon/Nikkor alone as there are so many good photographic systems with other major labels. So, other than my initail effort on the Nikon/Nikor, I am also taking the chance begin compiling some of the other information on other respectful labels as supplementary information for surfers. As there are already many excellent, established resources on the Network on the ame topic , probablyt I don't have to pursue one by one in details but simply confine my own effort within the early series of Nippon Kogaku and Nikkor only but I would also take the opportunity to introduce other equally good photograophic resources from comparing brands. This Message Board was created just for that purpose to patch things that I feel that might be missing in my own PIM site - as well as to provide a gateway for those that were not being featured yet. You may use it for whatever you think / deem suitable - regardless it is questions & answers (Q&A) or just make good use of it to share experience among one another on the rangefinder system. Lastly, as some of the remarks presented herein may be entirely personal and I do not wish to influence any decision prior to any potential purchases or disposal of your equipment. Naturally, you are always encouraged to make good use of this convenience of the MB here to present your own thoughts / views as well. Enjoy.

This site is specifically created for any rangefinder camera models and/or optical group of the system, its creator. Please don't mail me other than constructive suggestions or rectifying mistakes found in this site, thanking you. Since this is a non-profitable resource site - The developer of this site reserves the rights to censor or delete any inappropriate, unrelated, misleading or excessively hostile messages posted herein. If your intention is to dispose your Rangefinder camera(s), lenses or its accompanying accessories or looking for a used model or any of its system components, please use a separate section with a higher volume of traffic Free Trade Zone site instead. The Photography In Malaysia has no Guestbook on its own, because it is an integral part of the MIR site. But if you want to leave a note on your experience visiting this site, you may use the MIR's Guestbook at another new window by clicking on the Guestbook Link.

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Rangefinder camera models/RF-lenses indexes for various camera brands/labels:-
Leica/Leitz | Contax cameras / Carl Zeiss Jena Lenses | Seiki Kogaku / Canon / Senenar lenses
Nikon/ Nippon Kogaku Rangefinder cameras/Nikkor lenses
Note:- Here is an alternate MB for various labels on MF/AF SLR Lenses

The respective Message Boards are some of the HARDEST hit section of the PIM site, if at any one time, the traffic is high - the table/content may take a while to load the data, just be patience. If it stalls, just click on the 'Reload' or 'Refresh' button on your browser menu once to re-attempt. Thank you.

1. From : rick oleson (rick_oleson@yahoo.com)
Url : http://rick_oleson.tripod.com
Date : 07:03 PM Thursday 18 September, 2008

Hi JEff:

I'm afraid it makes no business sense at all, and that is the reason why nobody is doing it. It is true that there are millions of analog cameras in existence, but they are divided up among Nikon F, F2, F3, F4, F5,FM, FM2, FM3A, Canon F1, F1N, EOS1, Olympus OM1-4, Pentax LX, and many other models, no two of which could accept a single digital back, so to serve that market would require the tooling investment of not one but a dozen or more separate products. In addition, all of those cameras are old and discontinued models; as they wear out, the size of that already limited market will shrink, there is no possibility of new customers coming along in the future to repay the investment. And last but not least, by definition the owners of those cameras are people who have resisted going digital, either for reasons of cost or just a tendency to be "late adopters" of the new technology. These people tend to be the least profitable clientele there is, slow to buy and reluctant to pay full price. Digital technology is evolving so fast that by the time these people decide to buy an item it will be obsolete. There is simply no rational business argument for investing millions of dollars to create a product for a limited, shrinking market of people who are slow to react and don't want to pay for it when they finally decide they're interested.

The way to make a high performance product at an attractive price is to make a huge number of them all alike, and the way to do that is to make it appeal to the largest possible group of people and place no limits on future market growth.

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2. From : JEff (private@nomail.com)
Url : http://
Date : 11:59 AM Thursday 18 September, 2008

Hey.. why they are no funding for someone to invest into universal digital back ? Instead of provides funding to wasteful wall streets financial giants.. I tend to agree with leo that " ..it makes plenty of business sense as they are literally millions of analogue SLRs out there. I think Kodak (or Fuji) with dying film businesses and with their knowhow on previous research on Nikon/Canon Digital SLR film back adaptation and/or conversion could help to sustain a business cycle of at least another 10 years for them to find other viable new businesses venture... Kodak digital color / compression management was still among the best in the business ...they last produced a film back adaptation on 6 megapixels Nikon/Canon (excluding their own label, the last of their attempt with a 14 megapixels DCS-14 series - getting a film back in 10 megapixels spec should not be too much of a problem. The whole trouble is, Kodak used to practice "Killing the goose that laid the golden egg" by selling their kit at ridiculous prices, management was at fault, I guess when years ago - they were easily the pioneer as well as the kingpin in this medium ... if they ever had the foresight in thinking of mass market appeal during that period, they wouldn't be in current state right now". Good thought !

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3. From : JEff (private@nomail.com)
Url : http://
Date : 11:53 AM Thursday 18 September, 2008

THANKS ! USD6K ? day light robbery ... the Leica Digital M8 Search at Ebay Leica M8 10.3 Megapixels ranges New from:$3,999.00 to Used from:$3,450.00 only..

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4. From : rick oleson (rick_oleson@yahoo.com)
Url : http://rick_oleson.tripod.com
Date : 11:46 AM Wednesday 17 September, 2008

Hi Jeffs:

The Leica Digital Modul R was a 10MP back with a 1.37x crop factor. It cost $6,000 as an accessory for a camera that itself cost about $4,000 without a lens. I suppose it goes without saying that there are less expensive ways to make digital photos with Leica lenses.

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5. From : Jeffs (question@yoursite.com)
Url : http://
Date : 02:15 PM Tuesday 16 September, 2008

Dea Rick, I read this

"... Leica World First 35mm Digital Back Wednesday, 29 September 2004 This year's photokina photo trade fair in Cologne will witness the presentation of the world's first digital 35mm camera back by Leica Camera AG, Solms. Using the LEICA DIGITAL-MODUL-R, the analog SLR cameras LEICA R8 and R9 can be transformed into digital cameras in next to no time. Any of the high-performance lenses of the Leica R system made after 1965 can be used in combination with this new development to produce top-quality digital and analog photos...".

Do you know what the the pixel size it offers ? Or does anyone knows ? Thanks !

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6. From : Kakaman (mail_will_bounce@mir.com.my)
Url : http://www.MIR.my
Date : 11:37 AM Friday 12 September, 2008

Site Progress Update 07.09.2008:- A visual Profile on
Leica MP Gray Anthracite Kit with matching grey Leicavit-M.

"...The highly exclusive Leica MP Anthracite* special-edition model was designed especially for the Japanese market. Its lacquering is entirely hand-applied, and is resistant to abrasion. The camera is available as a set, with a Leicavit in anthracite, in a limited edition of 600 units. Individual examples are also available outside Japan. Other infor: Leica 50th Anniversary MP gray chrome Anthracite Titanium was made for the Japanese home market, reportedly 400 made with matching Leicavit and 35/2. It has a .72 finder, and classic old style vulcanite body covering. The box is clearly labeled "Leica M Series 50th Anniversary Model" but unfortunately the body has no such engraving. It's a beautiful camera, but what was Solms thinking in not engraving the body and winder? Only a handful were officially imported into the USA .....".

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7. From : Kakaman (mail_will_bounce@mir.com.my)
Url : http://www.MIR.my
Date : 11:37 AM Friday 12 September, 2008

Site Progress Update 07.09.2008:- A visual Profile on
LEICA MP Chrome, 0.58X; LEICA MP Black Lacquer, 0.58X ; LEICA MP Black Lacquer, 0.72X (10302), 2003;

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8. From : Kakaman (mail_will_bounce@mir.com.my)
Url : http://www.MIR.my
Date : 11:35 AM Friday 12 September, 2008

Site Progress Update 07.09.2008:- A visual Profile on
Leica MP 0.72x (10301) LHSA 1968~2003 Grey hammertone finish Special Edition.

A very unusual finish for a MP model. Previously known Leica having this unique dressing was the variants such as Leica M2 & MD. It came with matching hammertone-grey lens hood and Leicavit-M. The lens was an usual Summicron-M 2/35mm ASPH with just LHSA engraving.

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9. From : Rick Oleson (rick_oleson@yahoo.com)
Url : http://rick_oleson.tripod.com
Date : 02:21 AM Monday 08 September, 2008

Hi David:

The Contax name, like other things Zeiss-Ikon, has a complicated history.

The Contax I introduced the Contax RF bayonet mount (actually two bayonets, one used only for 50mm lenses and the other for teles and wide angles) in 1932. This bayonet system remained unchanged throughout the Contax rangefinder series - I, II, III, IIa and IIIa - and it was also adopted, with a small modification, by Nikon for their I, M, S, S2, S3 and SP rangefinder cameras. Like other rangefinder lens mounts, it cannot be used on an SLR because the lens flange is too close to the film to allow room for the mirror in an SLR.

After WWII, there were suddenly two Zeiss-Ikon companies, one in East and the other in West Germany. The West German branch, in Stuttgart, developed an all-new line of rangefinder cameras using the Contax bayonet lens mount, and launched the Contax IIa in 1950. Meanwhile, the East German group completed work on an all-new SLR camera that had been in development since the beginning of the War. This camera was introduced at the 1948 Leipzig Fair as the Contax S. The Contax S was the originator of the M42 lens mount, which was immediately adopted by KW as they reintroduced the prewar Praktiflex as the Praktica with the new mount. In addition to introducing the M42 mount, the Contax S also gave us the first eye-level pentaprism viewfinder, and it was also the first optical viewfinder system to provide (with the standard 58/2.0 lens attached) a 1:1 magnification in the finder.

A later version of the Contax S, the Contax F, introduced the first auto-diaphragm M42 lens, with the pin-actuated diaphragm system that became the standard for Pentax and other later M42 cameras. In fact, even the Pentax name came from Zeiss-Ikon Dresden: when legal disputes with Z-I Stuttgart forced them to give up the Contax name in the 1950s, Z-I Dresden copyrighted two new names based on the "Pentaprism Contax" camera series: one of these was "Pentacon", which became the new name for the German SLRs, and the other was "Pentax", which they released to Asahi Optical Company of Japan to use as the new name for their Asahiflex camera line when they added a pentaprism viewfinder around 1957.

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10. From : David E. Costley (prefer@private.com)
Url : http://nil
Date : 01:42 PM Sunday 07 September, 2008

THANKS, RIck. Didn't expect such a quick answer. Actually these had been asked in a rangefinder online forum/board elsewhere, for months - no one bothers to reply it. I guess one thing that I like about here is, friendliness. I like the new profile on the Nikon s3 as lead provided on the earlier post by Mr. kakaman (leofoo?).

You mean Contax 1 is using the M42 from the start ? So, they are the pioneer on this new mount dimension ? interesting I didn't know that. I read a bout the Bayonet lens mount by Contax at a few posts earlier.

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