I never owned one of these back inthe day. The closest I came was to see them in a GSA school contract pictured. They had somehow obtained a presence their---if I didn't just dream tha. It is possible that I never saw one. There were less than 14,000 of these made, the best I can calculate. These were made during the year of 1959, and may well have taken a few years to be completely sell.
When you are reading about the history of various 127 cameras, different perceptions and opinions are expressed about the time-frame during which 127 film cameras enjoyed teir greatest popularity. The 127 4x4 Baby Rolleifley camera camer out first substantially prior to WWII. I can find little referece to using it to make so-called Super-Slides when these early 4x4 TLR's are cited.
This idea probably came about as driven by marking departments after field photographers collectively discovered that the 127 film (1-5/8 x 1-5/8 inches) format used by these TLR's incidentally would make the same size transparency, and fit within the portal for the 35 mm film slide projectors. With a new square mount, the resulting image area projected from these new mounts was much larger and more impressive. Thereby the Super-Slide was born.
I am guessing, based on all the infromation that I can find, as well as recollections of my own dad's activities with these cameras, as pertaining to slides. Now, I do recall hanging around and watching Dad develope full-sized 120 color transparencies. Talk about super slides. He had a special 120 capable projector to fit them. Ofteh, Dad would meticulously plce finish transparencies betwwen two thin piece of clear greenish glass. The he'd use medical tape to tape the sides carefully until a slide was finished.
This had to have been around 1955 or 1956. Dad had Rolleicords, Rolleiflexes and a host of accessories. I beleive that he also had one Baby Rollei. I don't recall then or now seeing any 127 super- slides from that period. Going thrugh the family pictures that I have access to, the first 127 super-slides came about during 1956 until about 1963. This is my perspective. Others say that the super-slide phenomenon occrred much earlier in the fifties or late forties.
Here's my theory. WE know that 127 film became available during the first decade ore so of the 20th Century--by one account for the Kodak vest-pocket camera. Quite a lot of thes cameras were made over the years leading up to the advent of the Baby Rollei and other 4x4 TLR's. It would be silly to assume that quite a number of users became aware of this larger slide idea and used them with homemade mounts until some enterprising manufacturer offered the mounts commercially.
Kodak was much the MicroSoft of last Century. When a new idea came out that they liked, they bought it or jusrt stole it and it became one of their products. My money is on them having been active in makin gthe mounts early and pushing this idea of super-slides trough advertisements. At least until they decided to come out with their 126 Instamatic cassette which became their proprietary baby.
The fact that so many companies seemed to try to get on the super-slide bandwagon during the last few years of the fifties sixties and the first few years of the sixties, indicates a perception that a boom was happening with 127 Super-Slide cameras. Sawyer's, the View Master people took on their sold camera of their existence during this time. It was a Topcon 127 TLR camera called the Primo Junior under the Topcon Label, and simply Sawyer's 55--under the former.
Minolta is said tohave had one. I have never had a MInolta. Komaflex-S was an SLR devoted to 127 during the same period. Yashica, Topcon, Rollei, also had theri 44 TLR's. AND RICOHEVER PRESN T IN THE PHOTOGRAPHY MARKET OF THOSE DAYS HAD A FEW ATTEMPTS IN THIS FORMAT FOR BOTH UPPER AND LOWER END MARKETS. The culmination seemd to be about the turn of the r year from 1959-1960. Some of these TLR 127 cameras were both announce and discontinued the same year of straddling the years 1859-1960.
One of the most interesting 127 TLR offering actually came from Ricoh during 1959. It was the Ricoh high-end Ricohmatic 44. I have one now and am very imressed with the design. Although, the overall concept was very simkilar to other TLR's of the period--the styling and design departed in two important ways. First, the style was after the very popular early 60's squares, lines, and streamlining that eventually took over almost everything of th eera.
Replacing the leather case with a plasic hinged cover, and the elatheretter body covering with a quality metal finished in a intrument-like greay, light tan, or blue finish, certianly broke the mold for that vintage. Controls were well-thought out, nothing startlingly new but mostly borrowed or rearranged to make controls seem different. For example, the two side thub-index finger levers were obviously inspired mby the Minolta Autocord (or Meopta or early Mamiya)--but it was exactly the same. The thumb wheels that controlled the the shutter speed and aperature, where called ASA and light respectively.
The selenium passive lightmeter (requiring no battery), was coupled to the controls so that by aligning the light meter with the meter needle, you were actually setting the controls--linked qas they were. This feature was most like the Rollei Magic. The instruction manual, however, did fully explain how to use the sttintg manually as well.
The lens was a Riken lens, 3.5 as were most other cameras of this configuration. The viewfinder was bright, and the flip up finder used an old Voigtlander inovation for tricking one eye into folloowing the action through it when it was down and superimposing the outline of the from ot the finder over the scene being followed by the other eye. It kind of like what used to happen when men would wear only one eyeglass--or monocle. It made them think they were seeing clearly out of both eyes. This kind of optical illusion approach has been used for many different applications over the yearsw. It is used quite cleverly here.
The viewfinder focusing magnifier flips up with a finger. They tend to be very hard to get up until you think you are going to break it. This may be adjustable. But if not, it is inconvenient. The front cover will not come down without the lens hood being up, but the entire cover can be removed easily enough. If I were using it in the field, the cover would have to go.
The back film access latch takes th eform of a twist key which is unique too. The cable release socket is recellsed into the left side near the shutter release. The shutter is cocked automatically upon d.
