Shot on a Konica C35, a compact 35mm rangefinder first introduced in 1968, known for its sharp Hexanon 38mm f/2.8 lens and fully automatic exposure. Small enough to slip into a coat pocket, it was one of the first “point and shoot” cameras that still delivered rich, contrasty images.
Konica sold it at home as the Journey Konica, and that is still what it is for. There is nothing to set beyond the film speed. A CdS cell beside the lens picks the shutter speed and aperture, a needle in the finder shows what it chose, and you focus by lining up a small yellow patch. The leaf shutter is close to silent. The whole camera weighs about as much as a paperback.
These frames are from early spring in the mountains of Nagano, with snow still under the cedars and cherry blossom already out in the towns.
Umbrellas at dusk
The rain had just stopped. The sun came through under the cloud and everyone on the shore turned to face it at once.
Matsumoto Castle across the moat
The black keep is one of the oldest surviving in Japan. The Hexanon holds the stonework and the far hills in the same frame without complaint.
Cherry blossom over a lane
The C35 meters for the whole scene, so the blossom goes a touch bright and the shadows stay deep. That is the look.
A shopfront, a post box, a bicycle
Flat midday light. Film flattens nothing here: the red of the post box and the green of the sign both hold.
Through the glass
Focusing a rangefinder through glass is a guess. This one landed.
Snow under the cedars
The lens is at its best here, where the contrast is in the scene rather than in the light.
A shrine guardian
A stone komainu at a shrine, the characters for “dedicated” carved into its plinth, snow on its back.
A curtain of water
The slowest speed the leaf shutter offers is 1/30 of a second, which softens the water without turning it to milk.
A second fall
Steeper, dropping through bare trees.
The castle from the garden
The same keep from the garden side, with a crowd under the blossom.
Kumano Kotai shrine
The gate of Kumano Kotai shrine, which straddles the old pass between Nagano and Gunma.
The road to the mountain
Shooting toward the sun, the lens flares a little and the colours go warm.
A stall outside an old storefront
An old wooden storefront with a stall set up outside, a barber’s pole, and a man on a stool.
Notes on the Konica C35
What the C35 gets right is that it decides for you. With no aperture or shutter dial there is nothing to fiddle with, so you look at the scene instead of the camera, and the Hexanon is sharp enough that the results do not feel like a compromise.
Two things to know before buying one. The rangefinder patch on a fifty-year-old example is often faint, so check it in daylight before you commit. And the meter was built for a PX675 mercury cell that is no longer made; a zinc-air hearing-aid battery or an adapter does the job.