Flex'n'Rex
I know which of these two is prettier, but that's a personal opinion and I freely admit I am not exactly unbiased.
The Contarex Special considerably exceeds the already not exactly petite Leicaflex in bulk. Keep in mind that the Special is considerably slimmer than the original Contarex "Bullauge", which has been incorrectly and non-sensically translated into English as "Bull's Eye". Bullauge means "porthole" - a ship's circular window with a solid metal frame (or "scuttle", for those who have a RN background), for obvious reasons.
Originally I didn't want a Contasaurus Rex. I certainly don't want the original one. I have a friend who has one. It doesn't work. He showed me how incredibly difficult it is just to get the top cover off. It's axiomatic that some collateral damage is incurred before you get to whatever you want to fix. No way I'll ever get one of those. But after shooting a few films with the Zeiss Ultron on an Icarex, and being delighted with the results, I can be forgiven for wanting to try a Planar on a ZI.
The Special is much simpler in layout. It's almost a normal camera. Almost, but not quite. It still is, tangibly and intimidatingly, a Contarex. But at least it doesn't have this horrendously complex, fragile and also spectacularly ugly (OK, that is just my opinion) selenium meter which would not be likely to work any more today.
The Contarex Special comes with a prism viewfinder that can easily be exchanged against a viewfinder and a plain ground glass focusing screen that can be exchanged against a Fresnel screen with a split image circle.
I only have the prism viewfinder and the plain focusing screen, but I find that focusing is rather easy with the Planar lens. The scene just appears to jump in and out of focus. However, a Contarex user should not expect (and won't get) a huge, bright viewfinder screen like in a Leicaflex.
Shot with:
Canon EOS600D
Leica Bellows R (16860)
Leica 100mm f/4 Macro Elmar-R, bellows version (11230)
Flex'n'Rex
I know which of these two is prettier, but that's a personal opinion and I freely admit I am not exactly unbiased.
The Contarex Special considerably exceeds the already not exactly petite Leicaflex in bulk. Keep in mind that the Special is considerably slimmer than the original Contarex "Bullauge", which has been incorrectly and non-sensically translated into English as "Bull's Eye". Bullauge means "porthole" - a ship's circular window with a solid metal frame (or "scuttle", for those who have a RN background), for obvious reasons.
Originally I didn't want a Contasaurus Rex. I certainly don't want the original one. I have a friend who has one. It doesn't work. He showed me how incredibly difficult it is just to get the top cover off. It's axiomatic that some collateral damage is incurred before you get to whatever you want to fix. No way I'll ever get one of those. But after shooting a few films with the Zeiss Ultron on an Icarex, and being delighted with the results, I can be forgiven for wanting to try a Planar on a ZI.
The Special is much simpler in layout. It's almost a normal camera. Almost, but not quite. It still is, tangibly and intimidatingly, a Contarex. But at least it doesn't have this horrendously complex, fragile and also spectacularly ugly (OK, that is just my opinion) selenium meter which would not be likely to work any more today.
The Contarex Special comes with a prism viewfinder that can easily be exchanged against a viewfinder and a plain ground glass focusing screen that can be exchanged against a Fresnel screen with a split image circle.
I only have the prism viewfinder and the plain focusing screen, but I find that focusing is rather easy with the Planar lens. The scene just appears to jump in and out of focus. However, a Contarex user should not expect (and won't get) a huge, bright viewfinder screen like in a Leicaflex.
Shot with:
Canon EOS600D
Leica Bellows R (16860)
Leica 100mm f/4 Macro Elmar-R, bellows version (11230)