Talk:Leica copies

Which was Canon's first Leica copy?

Seiki Kogaku KK was established in late 1933 based on the idea to make a 35mm rangefinder camera on the lines of the two German ones popular at the time; the Leica and the Contax. Leitz had patented several important camera functions and Zeiss had worked hard to avoid infringements, resulting in an extremely complex camera as opposed to the very elegant Leitz design. The Japanese designer Yoshida studied both and the result was a mixture of the two German cameras: Leica body and mechanisms, but Contax focusing and bayonet lens mount. The camera was first called the Kwanon, but in 1935, the Canon was introduced. In 1939, a new model without rangefinder was introduced, without the focusing mount, but with a screw mount with the same pitch and thread diameter as used in the previous focusing bayonet mount, called the J-flange. After WW-II, the Contax type focusing lens mount was dropped. Work on the Canon threaded lens mount progressed slowly during the second half of the 1940s, resulting in the semi-universal lens mount flange, as first seen on the Canon S-II and then on the Canon IIB in 1949. During the production run of the Canon III manufactured in 1951 and 1952, the universal Leica thread was introduced.

For further reading, see Peter Dechert's Canon Rangefinder Cameras 1933-68.

Jan von Erpecom 22:05, 27 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Not placing the Canon/Kwanon in 1934 distorts the historic record. Compared to other variances of the copies to the Leica standard, the lens and mount are a minimal variance.  The prewar Canon bodies were closer to the Leica concept, than the post war.   The logic to exclude the Kwanon would also exclude the Minolta and Periflex from the list, as these never came as close to the Leica standard as the original Kwanon. --Kevin Murray (talk) 14:04, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

'''Re. The Shanghai Camera Factory''' It is correct this factory used the SEAGUL trade mark from 1964, but never the name of the factory. Such information is out of the scope of this list. Please accept the removal of (SEAGULL).

Jan von Erpecom 08:56, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Add a section?
Zorki and Fed cameras pretending to be real Leicas, apparently mostly sold in the 1990s. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 49.147.24.172 (talk) 11:16, 3 June 2018 (UTC)