Excellent condition Zenza Bronica SQ-A. Comes with a film back, 80mm f2.8 Zenzanon lens with hood and the camera original box ( with matching serial number to the camera). Everything works 100% and is in excellent condition. Shutter works 100% and is accurate, the back works perfectly and doesn’t have any light leaks. The camera comes with a fresh battery. The lens is clean and free of haze. Gibson Guitars Guitars acquired the Hamilton name in 2001, when they purchased the Baldwin Piano Co. See Acrosonic or Baldwin for additional numbers. Serial numbers are for the first piano made in year shown. Bronica Lens Serial Numbers 9/28/2019 Www.craigcamera.com Serving Photo Collectors Since 1969 (Research on American Photographers 1839-1860) e-mail address: john@craigcamera.com (860) 496-9791P.O.BOX 1637,TORRINGTON, CT 06790FAX: (860) 496-0664 TOLL-FREE ORDERING 1-877-572-3686.

• Bronica Sq Serial Numbers Search

Introduced in March 1983^[1], the Bronica GS-1 in 6×7 cm format was the largest SLR produced by the company and the first medium format camera with TTL flash metering. It is a completely modular camera, with several optional focusing prisms and viewfinders (with and without exposure metering), lenses, and film backs. Tamron ended production of GS-1 cameras and lenses in June 2002, with sales continuing until stocks were depleted^[2].

Development

In developing the 6×7 camera (GS stands for 'Grand Shooting'^[3]), Bronica paid particular attention to implementing a LED display, using a Seiko #0 electronic shutter with digital control, an upgraded PG-series of lenses to overcome the small aperture of the #0 shutter, TTL-flash, multi-format backs and rejecting the use of a revolving back to reduce size and weight, and make it a mobile camera.

During the design phase a #1 shutter with a larger 30mm aperture was considered. However, Bronica found that the helicoid diametre would have become 100mm or more, countering the purpose of a (relatively) small and light weight system, and in addition the shutter speed would be limited to 1/400 (not 1/500 as with #0 shutters). The choice of a #0 shutter was then made even if it restricted the possibility of large aperture lenses, especially of longer focal lengths. In practice the design of the GS-1 made it possible to differentiate the GS-1 from its main competitors, the heavy Mamiya RZ and Mamiya RB 6x7-cameras with rotating backs and Seiko #1 shutters.

Designing the new PG-lenses for the small shutter aperture, Bronica emphasized correction of aberrations, reducing vignetting and a unified color balance for the whole series, with particular attention paid to distortion, aberrations, field curvature and chromatic aberration for the wide angle lenses.^[1]

Body

The GS-1 body is wider than the SQ-A, due to the larger film format, however the depth and height are about the same. The body, back base and mount are made of a die cast light alloy. The mount is stainless steel, while the front, left and right body covers are made of reinforced plastic. The body weighs 630g.^[1] About 22 500 camera bodies were made in total, with a first series (serial 310XXXX) of about 1500 units, and a internally revised series of about 21 000 (serial 311XXXX, 312XXXX and 313XXXX). The last 12 000 or so had small updates to the finish (black buttons). One camera (serial 3118000) has been noted with a brown leather finish (similar to certain other Bronica special editions), and a 80mm F3.5 lens (serial 8400001) with a white lens cover. This was possibly a one off for promotional use when the 80mm F3.5 lens was launched in 1996.

Lenses

A lens- or leaf-shutter camera, the GS-1 will synchronize flash at all available shutter speeds. Lenses are designated 'PG', with available focal lengths of 50, 65, 80, 100, 110, 150, 200, 250, 500 mm, and two teleconverters (1.4× and 2×). At the introduction of the camera, only the 50, 65, 100, 150, 200 and 250mm lenses were available, with a 110mm, 350mm (never released) and 500mm being announced.^[1] The 110mm and 200mm lenses were later presented together with the teleconverters at the 1984 Photokina.^[4] The 500mm lens was only made by special order. The 80mm was the last of the GS-1 lenses, introduced in 1997, and is difficult to find. The 150mm lens is a long-focus design (not a telephoto like the 200mm and 250mm), and is supposed to give especially beautiful background blur and a natural and soft image wide open.^[5]

All lenses have electronic Seiko #0 shutters, which communicate with the body. The shutter dial and digitized control circuit is on the body.

The lenses have comparable or better close focusing distances than Hasselblad or Pentax 6x7 lenses, but less than bellows focusing cameras, such as the Mamiya RZ67. Extension tubes of 18mm and 36mm are available for specialized close focus photography, and the 110mm macro with 36mm extension tube goes to 1:1.

While the lens flange is different from the SQ-mount, the focal flange distance of 85mm is the same.^[1] Fotodiox makes adapters for mounting PG-lenses on Mamiya M645, Pentax 645, Nikon F, Canon EF, Pentax K and Sony Alpha mounts.

Viewfinders and focusing screens

The GS-1 had a waist level, prism, AE-prism and rotary AE-prism viewfinders. The field of view ratio for all viewfinders is 94%. The waist level finder has a 4.3X magnification. The basic prism finder was based on the ETR-finder, and has a magnification of 0.87X with the 100mm lens at infinity and a 1.5 diopter. It weighs 425 g.^[1] The standard AE-finder also has a magnification of 0.87X, and weighs 460 g and has a metering range of EV 2-17 (ISO 100). Using an AE-finder in aperture priority mode allows the camera system to set the shutter using 1/8 steps, though the selected speed is rounded to 1/2 steps in the display, while the manual shutter speed dial only has full steps.^[1] By default the camera came with a plain matte focusing screen.

It is easy to use the camera both in vertical and horizontal orientation with one of the eye level finders. However, it is difficult to shoot vertical pictures with the waist level finder. Bronica had the same design challenge with waist level horizontal shots for the ETR, and used the same patented (No. 950970) solution for the GS-1, a rotary prism viewfinder, with both average and spot metering.^[1]

Backs

With the appropriate back, the camera will shoot a wide range of film sizes, including 6×4.5, 6×6, 6×7 cm, and Polaroid. The 6x4.5, 6×6 and 6×7 cm formats could be obtained in either 120 or 220 roll length. Unlike some other Bronicas the GS-1 never had backs for 35mm film, even though 24x69mm and 24x36mm backs were announced with the system.^[1] The 6x7 back is landscape and the 645 back is vertical unless the camera is rotated.

TTL flash

The GS-1 was also available with a dedicated G-1 speedlight flash and manually operated speed grip which allowed TTL-flash metering together with the AE-prism. This made the GS-1 the first medium format camera with TTL flash capability at its introduction i 1983, before the Hasselblad 500 ELX and Rolleiflex 6006 came to market in 1984. It was also the only 6x7 camera with TTL flash until the introduction of the Pentax 67II in 1998. It is not possible to get TTL flash using the Sunpak MX-2D TTL module designed for older Minolta cameras, or Metz SCA 386 TTL module for Minolta, even thought some sources speculated that this was possible (you will only get the flash ready light in the finder, though no TTL).^[6]. The G-1 flash shares some components with, and may have been produced by National/Panasonic. The Bronica SQ-Ai and ETRSi support TTL-flash through the Metz SCA 386 TTL-module, but this instead uses a dedicated 6-pin TTL connector on the camera body, as with the Mamiya 645 Pro TL and Hasselblad 503-series.

Notes

1. ↑ ^{1.01.11.21.31.41.51.61.71.81.9}Shashin Kōgyō (Photographic Industries) Vol. 41, No. 9 (1983) pp 77-83.
2. ↑Tamron end of production note (archived)
3. ↑ブロニカ!―僕が愛した伝説の中判カメラ / Bronica! The legendary medium format camera I loved (2010) p. 163
4. ↑Popular Photography, January 1985 p. 86
5. ↑現代カメラ新書別冊　中型カメラシリーズ4　新・ゼンザブロニカのすべて / Modern camera new book separate volume Medium-sized camera series 4 New ・ all of Zenza Bronica (1984) p. 104
6. ↑Photo.net post regarding Adorama comment

Links

• Bronica Users Group (BUG) at the Yahoo Groups site
• GS-1 information from the medfmt.8k.com website (archived copy from the Internet Archive, from March 2011; mostly an archive of even older bulletin board-based discussion, with a few pictures).

At around 1960, a man the Americans called “Mr. Zenza” came to the USA and had lunch with Burt Keppler, the former well-known publisher of Modern Photography and Popular Photography magazines in the United States and one of the most respected and influential figures in the history of the camera industry. Keppler, who passed away in 2008, was a driving force behind the success of the Japanese camera industry. Mr. Zenza was in America to sell his camera, the Zenza Bronica. It was to become a widely used camera family, not least by recording millions of weddings shot on medium format film.

Rewind.

Zenzaburo Yoshino was born in 1911 as the third son of a prosperous rice dealer, which even at that time had over 150 employees. Yoshino initially continued his family’s rice business. However, in the aftermath of WW II and the resulting US occupational forces’ rice rationing and control over rice distribution he was keen to expand and diversify the business into new areas. Why he got interested in cameras is not clear, but he was known to enjoy a stroll over Ginza and looking at the various camera stores there. Being from a wealthy family he was certainly in a position to afford the expensive hobby of photography. Yoshino began to be known as a real camera mania, an obsessive photo enthusiast. He admired Victor Hasselblad, the Swedish inventor and photographer, known for developing the modular Hasselblad 6×6 cm medium format camera.

In 1946, Yoshino opened a used camera store called 新光堂写真機店 — Shinkoudou Shashinki-ten in Kanda-Tachō (神田多町), the ward of Chiyoda in Tokyo. Despite the hard times of the post-war era, many still affluent Japanese would sell off their cameras to buy the latest models. The shop was a viable business and prospering. Nonetheless Yoshino grew tired of simply buying and selling cameras. Thus behind the shop’s premises the 新光堂製作所 — Shinkoudou Manufacturing workshop was established in 1947, with the primary intention to design and manufacture cameras. They failed to do so, but to improve their skill and workmanship the workshop started producing delicate fashion accessories made of metal, such as metal cigarette cases, brooches, lighters and women’s compacts (portable beauty accessory with powder and mirror). In 1952 Yoshino wanted to try building a camera once more but realised that a better workshop was needed.

The actual birthplace of Bronica was an old Japanese-style building in Kami-Itabashi in Itabashi ward in northern Tokyo, a district known for its numerous small manufacturing operations. Zenzaburo Yoshino was a child of the Meiji era and was content with a modest and simple factory. It even served as a home for the Yoshino family, including their two children aged two at the time and a maid, on the first floor and the machinery, reception and delivery areas on the ground floor. The division of the house was not too dissimilar from his earlier experience of running the rice store.

The accessory business blossomed and a large proportion of the company’s income was re-invested into the development of a camera. Yoshino was not a trained camera designer, but he had a dream and two common Japanese personality traits: persistency and tenacity. It took eight years to finalise the design and build the camera, which he named Zenza Bronica – the name being partly derived from his name Zenzaburo and the Japanese term for 120 medium format sized film, buroni (Brownie).

Originally that first camera that went on sale in 1959 was simply called Zenza Bronica and later renamed Zenza Bronica type D (Deluxe) and the follow on model type S (Standard). The Bronica D was the Japanese answer to the Hasselblad and in several ways outclassed the Swedish offerings.

It was a 6×6cm single-lens reflex camera similar to Hasselblad in design style and size, but this camera had various advantages over the original Hasselblad 1600F and 1000F with focal plane shutters:

• the reflex mirror and aperture are returned to the original position after exposure
• to allow intruding retro-focus lenses, the reflex mirror is not just flipped up but sliding down
• very long exposures up to 10 seconds using self-timer
• inserting a dark slide automatically detaches the back preventing accidental exposure
• the film can be loaded fully automatically just as with the Rolleiflex without aligning the start mark

However, the Bronica D was not just a technical feat, it also was a very pleasing object to handle and showing Yoshino’s workshop’s experience in manufacturing fashion accessories. The chrome (actual stainless steel) elements and subtly curved lines gave it a delicate and precious appearance, not simply a metal box with a lens in front, despite the modular design. More information and pictures on Cameraquest.

The following Bronica Z and successor Bronicas, using large-coverage, high-quality Nikkor lenses, became instant successes. Bronica later introduced lenses of its own manufacture with its later camera designs.

Zenza Bronica Ltd. was eventually acquired by the lens manufacturer Tamron in 1998. Zenzaburo Yoshino died in 1988. As a response to the digital revolution Tamron discontinued the brand’s single-lens reflex models (SQ, ETR and GS) in October 2004. Bronica’s last model, the RF645 rangefinder camera, was discontinued in October 2005 and Tamron announced the termination of the Bronica brand and medium format cameras.

Classic Bronica Resources

Bronica Classic Medium Format Cameras pages — the most comprehensive information in English on all things Bronica

Bronica Users Group on Yahoo! Groups

Bronica D, C, S, S2, S2a, EC Group on Flickr

Maintainance of Zenza Bronica cameras: The son of Zenzaburo Yoshino established a company named “1st Technical Service”. They have many genuine Bronica parts. Electronical circuits also stocked. No parts for type D and type S. Tel +81-3-5390-2833 (Japan) [Note: not verified whether this still exists]

Tamron are still providing parts and service to the more recent Bronica medium format cameras. In case you need help, please take advantage of our Camera Parts & Repair Service.

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