The Great Contarex Instruction Manual Fiasco:
Missing the “bullseye eye” with hilarious unintentional misdirection
By Jason Schneider
The Germans have a reputation for brutal directness, and the technical precision built into the German language has long been admired by scientists—and photographers. For example, what in English we blithely allude to as a “light meter” is always called a “belichtungsmesser,” an “exposure meter,” in German. A focal plane shutter (which isn’t really in the image plane anyway, but slightly in front of it), the Germans call a schlitzverschluss, a slit sutter, which tells you exactly what it does rather than vaguely alluding to its location. Sooo—when an archetypal German company like Zeiss unleashed the original Contarex, its sensational new, top-of-the-line pro 35mm SLR back in 1958, you’d think it would be accompanied by a clear, concise, masterfully precise instruction manual. Well, you’d be wrong.
The "Bullseye" Contarex of 1958 with its superb 50mm f/2 Planar lens: A masterpiece of German precision and flagrant over-design, it's a classic but its manual sure isn't!
The Contarex Manual, English Version: Perhaps something was lost in translation but the prose is stilted and often misleading to say the least.
Now the manual for the “Bullseye” Contarex, the one with the big round selenium cell on the front of the pentaprism housing (also affectionately known as the “Cyclops”) isn’t the worst manual I’ve encountered. Though at times longwinded, it does explain how to operate the camera, which is, after all, its primary function. But Its imprecision can be breathtaking. Take page 6, majestically entitled “The special features of the CONTAREX.” About a third of the way down the page is the following mind-numbing paragraph:
The infamous page 6 of the Contarex manual: Nice graphics, but claims for the "automatic exposure control" are, um, wildly inaccurate.
“The automatic exposure control. The diaphragm and the shutter speed settings are coupled to the exposure indicator in a way that, starting with one component, the other is determined automatically. The indicator can be seen in the viewfinder adjacent to the actual finder image and in addition, also on top of the CONTAREX.”
Though the English syntax is clunky, if you take this literally, the manual asserts that the Contarex offered a choice of aperture- or shutter-priority autoexposure way back in 1958! Rest assured this did not happen. Indeed it took about 20 years before A, S, and P modes were actually built into the Canon A-1 and promoted with great vigor.
Page 11: The B.S. continues, with implicit assertions of autoexposure. Is this just a language problem or intentional deceit? Probably the former.
The plot thickens on page 11 of the manual, which is entitled (what else?) Automatic exposure control and has an illustration of both metering methods, followed by this short paragraph purportedly explaining how the system works:
“Correct exposure on a film of given speed is determined by the aperture and the shutter speed. For this reason, the exposure-coupling of the CONTAREX is designed so that the photographer can start with either a shutter speed or an aperture, the other component then being set automatically by the exposure coupling and so ensuring correct exposure.” Well, to put it gently, that’s misleading.
The truth emerges for savvy Contarex users on page 12: Diagram on the right clearly implies the camera has a "center the needle" manual metering system.
For observant Contarex manual readers, the truth begins to emerge on page 12 which has nice illustrations of the shutter speed dial (left) and the aperture control dial (right). But what’s that needle and notch drawing at the extreme right-hand side of the page? Why it’s a “center-the- needle” metering index that appears in the finder to the right if the viewing image! In other words, you can start by choosing either the aperture or the shutter speed, and the system “automatically” provides the correct exposure so long as you manually adjust the other exposure parameter to center the needle. I guess that was automatic enough for Zeiss back in the day.
Happily, for Contarex owners the way its “center the needle” non-TTL, selenium cell metering works in the real world becomes clear on page 15 of the manual. To quote: “If an exposure is to be made with a pre-determined aperture, e. g. to obtain a definite depth of field, the aperture in question should be set by means of the aperture ring so that the aperture figure in the aperture scale is opposite the mark. Now sight through the viewfinder and turn the shutter speed setting ring so that the pointer in the viewfinder is opposite the mark. This sets the correct shutter speed in relation to the pre-selected aperture. In this case however only one shutter speed should be indicated, which should correspond to the mark, and snap in distinctly. When an intermediate value is indicated, turn the ring until it snaps in and then turn the aperture-setting ring until the pointer is exactly opposite the mark.”
The whole truth at last! Second paragraph on page 15 of the manual accurately describes how the metering system works in stilted prose.
While this excerpt may not be a masterpiece of English prose, at least it’s clear enough to guide most shooters and is a vast improvement over the arrant balderdash found on pages 6-11. In the end, the bullseye Contarex is the ultimate mixed bag. It has a superb lens mount, an exquisite (if limited) line of Zeiss lenses, impressive overall build quality, a splendid finish, and awesome picture taking capabilities. It’s also huge, heavy, overly complicated, hard to fix, and despite its professional bona fides, it lacks such standard features as a removable pentaprism, a ratcheted wind lever, and fully auto diaphragm operation (you must wind to the next exposure to reopen the lens to maximum aperture). For these and many other reasons bullseye Contarexes are an acquired taste, and they have a small but devoted following. Are they worth the $700-$800 currently being asked for pristine examples with 50mm f/2 Planar lens? Probably. Just make sure to take the manual with a large grain of salz, or better yet, a nice glass of schnapps!
The Contarex Bullseye System: Not as extensive as top pro 35mm systems by Nikon and Canon, but all lenses and accessories were topnotch. Heartfelt thanks to Butkus.org for posting the Contarex manual online, which was the source of most of the images used in this article.
Missing the “bullseye eye” with hilarious unintentional misdirection
By Jason Schneider
The Germans have a reputation for brutal directness, and the technical precision built into the German language has long been admired by scientists—and photographers. For example, what in English we blithely allude to as a “light meter” is always called a “belichtungsmesser,” an “exposure meter,” in German. A focal plane shutter (which isn’t really in the image plane anyway, but slightly in front of it), the Germans call a schlitzverschluss, a slit sutter, which tells you exactly what it does rather than vaguely alluding to its location. Sooo—when an archetypal German company like Zeiss unleashed the original Contarex, its sensational new, top-of-the-line pro 35mm SLR back in 1958, you’d think it would be accompanied by a clear, concise, masterfully precise instruction manual. Well, you’d be wrong.
The "Bullseye" Contarex of 1958 with its superb 50mm f/2 Planar lens: A masterpiece of German precision and flagrant over-design, it's a classic but its manual sure isn't!
The Contarex Manual, English Version: Perhaps something was lost in translation but the prose is stilted and often misleading to say the least.
Now the manual for the “Bullseye” Contarex, the one with the big round selenium cell on the front of the pentaprism housing (also affectionately known as the “Cyclops”) isn’t the worst manual I’ve encountered. Though at times longwinded, it does explain how to operate the camera, which is, after all, its primary function. But Its imprecision can be breathtaking. Take page 6, majestically entitled “The special features of the CONTAREX.” About a third of the way down the page is the following mind-numbing paragraph:
The infamous page 6 of the Contarex manual: Nice graphics, but claims for the "automatic exposure control" are, um, wildly inaccurate.
“The automatic exposure control. The diaphragm and the shutter speed settings are coupled to the exposure indicator in a way that, starting with one component, the other is determined automatically. The indicator can be seen in the viewfinder adjacent to the actual finder image and in addition, also on top of the CONTAREX.”
Though the English syntax is clunky, if you take this literally, the manual asserts that the Contarex offered a choice of aperture- or shutter-priority autoexposure way back in 1958! Rest assured this did not happen. Indeed it took about 20 years before A, S, and P modes were actually built into the Canon A-1 and promoted with great vigor.
Page 11: The B.S. continues, with implicit assertions of autoexposure. Is this just a language problem or intentional deceit? Probably the former.
The plot thickens on page 11 of the manual, which is entitled (what else?) Automatic exposure control and has an illustration of both metering methods, followed by this short paragraph purportedly explaining how the system works:
“Correct exposure on a film of given speed is determined by the aperture and the shutter speed. For this reason, the exposure-coupling of the CONTAREX is designed so that the photographer can start with either a shutter speed or an aperture, the other component then being set automatically by the exposure coupling and so ensuring correct exposure.” Well, to put it gently, that’s misleading.
The truth emerges for savvy Contarex users on page 12: Diagram on the right clearly implies the camera has a "center the needle" manual metering system.
For observant Contarex manual readers, the truth begins to emerge on page 12 which has nice illustrations of the shutter speed dial (left) and the aperture control dial (right). But what’s that needle and notch drawing at the extreme right-hand side of the page? Why it’s a “center-the- needle” metering index that appears in the finder to the right if the viewing image! In other words, you can start by choosing either the aperture or the shutter speed, and the system “automatically” provides the correct exposure so long as you manually adjust the other exposure parameter to center the needle. I guess that was automatic enough for Zeiss back in the day.
Happily, for Contarex owners the way its “center the needle” non-TTL, selenium cell metering works in the real world becomes clear on page 15 of the manual. To quote: “If an exposure is to be made with a pre-determined aperture, e. g. to obtain a definite depth of field, the aperture in question should be set by means of the aperture ring so that the aperture figure in the aperture scale is opposite the mark. Now sight through the viewfinder and turn the shutter speed setting ring so that the pointer in the viewfinder is opposite the mark. This sets the correct shutter speed in relation to the pre-selected aperture. In this case however only one shutter speed should be indicated, which should correspond to the mark, and snap in distinctly. When an intermediate value is indicated, turn the ring until it snaps in and then turn the aperture-setting ring until the pointer is exactly opposite the mark.”
The whole truth at last! Second paragraph on page 15 of the manual accurately describes how the metering system works in stilted prose.
While this excerpt may not be a masterpiece of English prose, at least it’s clear enough to guide most shooters and is a vast improvement over the arrant balderdash found on pages 6-11. In the end, the bullseye Contarex is the ultimate mixed bag. It has a superb lens mount, an exquisite (if limited) line of Zeiss lenses, impressive overall build quality, a splendid finish, and awesome picture taking capabilities. It’s also huge, heavy, overly complicated, hard to fix, and despite its professional bona fides, it lacks such standard features as a removable pentaprism, a ratcheted wind lever, and fully auto diaphragm operation (you must wind to the next exposure to reopen the lens to maximum aperture). For these and many other reasons bullseye Contarexes are an acquired taste, and they have a small but devoted following. Are they worth the $700-$800 currently being asked for pristine examples with 50mm f/2 Planar lens? Probably. Just make sure to take the manual with a large grain of salz, or better yet, a nice glass of schnapps!
The Contarex Bullseye System: Not as extensive as top pro 35mm systems by Nikon and Canon, but all lenses and accessories were topnotch. Heartfelt thanks to Butkus.org for posting the Contarex manual online, which was the source of most of the images used in this article.
