The Agfa camera - history

Aktien Gessellschaft fur Analin-Fabrikation - AGFA - was founded in 1873 with the first folding bellows type film and glass negative plate Agfa cameras starting production in 1925. The models were called Agfa Standard, Isolar and Billy with variations such as Billy-Clack.

Agfa also made many different models of simple box cameras with model names such as Box 24, Box 44 and Box 54 and later, in early post war years, the Synchro-Box featuring an art-deco fascia. In 1936, the company pioneered the subtractive colour negative/positive process producing high quality film suitable for movie and stills photography.

In the U.S.A., Agfa went into partnership with Ansco in 1928, renaming the company GAF which became well known for its Ansco colour films. In Europe, Agfa steamed ahead with all things photograpic, manufacturing processing chemicals, printing papers, film, cameras and accessories for enthusiasts, professionals and the graphic arts fields at its plants in Leverkusen and Wolfen. One of the company's most famous photographic printing papers was Agfa Record Rapid, capable of producing excellent exhibition quality black and white prints. In 1964, Agfa Ag merged with the highly respected photographic materials company Gaveart of Belgium to become Agfa-Gaveart and by which time it had already acquired Perutz Photowerke , Leonar-Werke and the photo paper manufacturer Mimosa. At its operational peak in the early 1980s, Agfa owned 24 factories around the world and employed 30,000 people.

Some of Agfa's best known post war cameras were the 35mm Agfaflex single lens reflex of 1959, which evolved to become the Agfaflex III featuring interchangeable lenses and viewing pentaprism and the Agfa Isolette series of folding roll film cameras for medium format 6X6 cm and 6X4.5 cm. The Agfa Automatic 66 of 1956 was another model designed to use medium format film producing 12 exposures on 120 film. The camera was fitted with a built-in light exposure meter coupled to the shutter mechanism to provide semi automatic operation. It could also be operated manually.