Historic Camera Quiz

[radiostationx]

Hi,
A bit of fun..
A historic camera of the 1970s, this example is a beauty, very good condition.
Can anyone identify it Manufacturer and Model ?
Extra points for why this particular model was so important.
My Dad bought one of these from a Dale St camera shop they were one of the first dealers (if not the first) to get stock in the UK.

[radiostationx]

The Konica C35AF was known as "the fool shooter", it was the worlds first commercially produced auto focus camera.
Konica were and still are a very inovative company.
At the time of release in 1977 the compact camera king was the Olympus Trip 35, it reigned supreme with that beautiful zuiko lens. An incredible 10 milion units were sold worldwide but
the trip 35 had a flaw, a user had to set the focus ring into one of 4 positions and some shots were spoiled by users leaving the ring in the wrong position.

The Konica C35 in standard form was already a brilliant camera and was already popular,it had evolved from the Konica Himatic 35 model of the early 70s and had brilliant results from the 38mm f2.8 hexanon lens (wider angle, more useful and some say better quality than the trip 35s 40mm zuiko..if you could any get better that is) but then one of Konicas engineers decided to experiment with electronics to detect the target and move the lens automatically.

That was ground breaking. Every photographers dream.. The C35AF was born, It has 450 electronic components inside the camera spread across 9 circuit boards before the days of surface mount technology.
This camera sold 1 million units in the first year. By far and away the best selling camera of 1977/8. 

This is the camera that started auto focus technology which we use in every camera and mobile phone today.

Konica carried on with improvements to make the C35AF2 and AF3 versions.



Given that the technology was a massive success, Opponents Canon nicked Konicas design of the C35AF and made the AF35M or "Autoboy" and that camera was cheaper than the Konica.
Canon carried on and produced more models of the Autoboy which was known as the Canon Shureshot famlily of cameras in USA/EU markets.

You can pick up a bit of photographic history in the Konica C35AF for as little as £10 in a boot sale.

Konica teamed up with Minolta and their 35mm film SLRs were very good indeed, they evolved into the Sony Alpha range of digital SLRs.
Konica still make some of the worlds finest photocopiers/printers and strangely their current logo is very similar to the autofocus one seen on the left side of the C35AF.