Tomiyama Art-Flex 4x5
It is not often you get to say you've held or used a 4x5 twin lens reflex camera. Maybe you were lucky enough to know someone who handed you a Gowlandflex that one time, or perhaps you stumbled across a Newman & Guardia Twin Lens Pattern camera at an antique store (what a find!)... Either way, users of the Tomiyama Art-Flex 4x5 certainly do belong to an exclusive club.
The Art-Flex 4x5 was produced by the Tomiyama Seisakusho Co. sometime during the 1960s. It is possible that these cameras were also exported as the Color-Flex 4x5 by Chiyoda Sankyo Co., a company with which Tomiyama had a close relationship. The design of the camera is simple. Take a sturdy aluminum box, attach a front lens standard holding identical lenses, and connect that standard to the camera body via bellows. Allow for rack focusing, as well as top-down waist level viewfinder for focusing and composition, and you have something that is fairly similar to the early Mamiyaflex TLR cameras, just a whole lot larger.
The only lens mentioned for this camera (that we could find in our research) is a Fujinar-W 150mm f/6.3. However, we were then paid a visit by our customer, Minh Thien, who brought in his Art-Flex 4x5 with a pair of Mamiya-Sekor 105mm f/3.5 lenses. Perhaps it had been specially modified for this lens, or perhaps Tomiyama made a small selection of interchangeable lenses... if we ever find out, we'll fill you in.
Count yourself fortunate if you happen upon an Art-Flex 4x5. Enjoy it, treasure it, use it.
za/sd
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