Did anyone here ever own/shoot Rectaflex?

So this is a fairly rare and weird 40's and 50's Italian SLR. I think (though there is controversy) that it was the first mass produced SLR to have instant-return mirror. Now that it comes to that, I think it must have also been one of the first with a split image device on the focusing screen, though it was a very poorly-executed one.

Believe it or not, I actually used to have one, despite the rarity. I found it in a thrift store in a shipyard town for fifteen dollars. I never could do anything with it. The shutter was holey (though the fast speeds looked accurate), I didn't have a takeup spool, and there was no real lens for it: the previous owner had (and this is a bunch of deduction) cut the back off an old Finettar lens (for the Finetta viewfinder camera, rebadged "Ditto" and "Dittar" for American market) and unscrewed the bayonet ring on the Rectaflex, put the remaining flange from the Finnetar inside the Rectaflex, and screwed the bayonet ring back on on top of it. I don't think it would have focused to infinity without more modification to the lens, but it was sure an attempt. I think it was the weirdest thing I'd ever seen someone do to a camera.

Surprisingly, they managed to do this without damaging the Rectaflex in the least, and when I got tired of having it around I sold it for a hundred and ten bucks without the improvised lens and mount, which I kept as my one proof that this hallucinatory little adventure even happened.

So does anyone here have experience with this camera? How were the lenses? I know most of them were made by the legendary Pierre Angenieux. The bayonet mount looks competently executed, even more so than Exakta, with a locking pin that must have slipped into a hole on the lens quite like a Nikon mount. The action of the mirror (raised by pressing the shutter release partway) was pleasantly easy and smooth, and the shutter seems like a very nice version of the Leica-type shutters of the time, with full slow speeds.

I've been making photos and collecting cameras for more than fifty years and I have only seen one "in the flesh" - at a camera show, where it was displayed but not for sale. The kind owner allowed me to handle it and fit the lenses for me to look into. He asked me not to fire the shutter because of its age and the availability of parts, so I did not try that.

My impression of the camera's build quality was that it was extremely high, difficult to achieve, I think, in postwar Italy, but that the material and finishes were first rate. The telephoto and normal lenses I tried focused smoothly and also appeared to be high quality. The unique mounting mechanism seemed well made and a highly functional design.

From the research I've done on this since I had that opportunity, I have seen only a handful on the market, and at very high prices. I am an "eat off the good China" kind of guy, and I personally would not buy a camera as a collectible only, but I would be extremely reluctant to do much shooting with one if I had the opportunity to acquire one, even at a reasonable price. There are so very few left in the wild, and each one is a nearly unique example of photographic history. I had hoped the owner would be attending the next local PHSNE show, but that has, sadly, been cancelled due to the COVID 19. If you ever find one again, I'll happily give you triple what you sold it for, but I'd be surprised to find one whose owner didn't understand its value. A grail camera for sure, but one that even I would be afraid to load up very often.

Andy

Only seen two or three over the years a various Camera Shows and at a Camera Repair Shop I used in Bari Italy, seemed to well made, even it the 80s it was very collectable, of the few that I had a chance to handle I would rate the build quality as good as Leica or Alpa of the same period. If had the money to spend on an high end camera I would get a late model Alpa as I would want to shoot with it.

I

Paul Howell said:

Only seen two or three over the years a various Camera Shows and at a Camera Repair Shop I used in Bari Italy, seemed to well made, even it the 80s it was very collectable, of the few that I had a chance to handle I would rate the build quality as good as Leica or Alpa of the same period. If had the money to spend on an high end camera I would get a late model Alpa as I would want to shoot with it.

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Honestly, from what I've heard of the Alpa, I would rather the Recta. The Alpa was easy to break from operating the controls in the wrong order, no? Or was that just the early Alpas?

Not sure, a few years ago the wife of a friend inherited an Alpa 11, her uncle was a biologist at a Southern University and used Alpa and Konica when in the field. My freind sent me the Alpa for a week, at least the 11 was very well made, I didn't have any issues with setting the shutter, rewinding film. The Kern Swiss 50 1.7 Macro is a sweet lens. The body he sent me was well used, the meter worked, they sold it sometime after that to a collector somewhere overseas. Prices have come down in the last year or so, thought about a Alpa 10 or 11 with the Schindler 50mm and a wide and short tele, but for that price I can get a late model Leica R body and couple of lens.

Paul Howell said:

Not sure, a few years ago the wife of a friend inherited an Alpa 11, her uncle was a biologist at a Southern University and used Alpa and Konica when in the field. My freind sent me the Alpa for a week, at least the 11 was very well made, I didn't have any issues with setting the shutter, rewinding film. The Kern Swiss 50 1.7 Macro is a sweet lens. The body he sent me was well used, the meter worked, they sold it sometime after that to a collector somewhere overseas. Prices have come down in the last year or so, thought about a Alpa 10 or 11 with the Schindler 50mm and a wide and short tele, but for that price I can get a late model Leica R body and couple of lens.

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A Southern University, you say... what state? It might be my Alma Mater, Southern Mississippi at Hattiesburg.

Anyways, I looked it up and it does seem to be the early Alpa Reflex, which is, by the way, a combined SLR/rangefinder, through about the Alpa 8, that had problems with the settings being changed out of order. Something similar to how you can't change shutter speeds on a Barnack Leica or a Soviet camera without the shutter cocked?

It also had a collapsible lens that would easily ruin the mirror if it was down when you pushed it in. I see that the third generation Alpas you mention were quite modern, if strikingly original in design. Nice.

Not sure, my friends live in Alabama but had the impression that her uncle lived in another state, I'll shoot them an email. The later model Alpa were odd, took some getting use to the film advance. When I was a working PJ in the 70s and 80 I can only think of one guy I saw on a regular bases who had an Alpa, well he had 2, don't recall the models, last time I saw him he had a Canon F1, needed the motor drive to keep up. Alpas is fast for manual wind, but not 5PFS fast.