Aeronautical and General Instruments, or Agi, was founded in 1915 and over a period of time established a thriving business making a wide range of precision instruments. Then in 1946 founded a subsidiary company, Agilux, which produced commercial cameras. During the latter quarter of the 1950’s they produced the Agimatic, pictured below.
As soon as I picked the camera up, I couldn’t help but be impressed with how solid and well made this small rangefinder was. Every where you look you not only see precision and attention to detail but a desire to make something enjoyable to hold and use.
The Agilux is an uncoupled rangefinder, sadly the mechanism for measuring the distance of your subject is no longer usable. So, I had to guess the distance from camera to subject and then input that into the distance scale on the lens.
In the image above you can see the button on the bottom that unlocks the film chamber. The viewfinder is the left hand window, the middle being the extinction light meter. I can see a number of boxes are visible. According to the manual you are supposed to look through the meter window and note the highest numbered box you can easily read.
You then transfer this number to the scale on the right hand side of the camera in the image above.
Let’s just zoom in a bit in the image below. Setting the film speed and the measured light intensity will by means of this ‘calculator reveal what aperture and shutter speed you need or combination thereof. I will be testing you on this.🤓
The lens included on my Agimatic ia a Anastigmat 45mm f 2.8. This can be changed by sliding the small lever situated towards the bottom of the shutter mechanism, pictured below.
The manual speaks of a telephoto lens being available to fit. When fitted the viewfinder can be altered to accommodate the different view by sliding the button situated on the top right ofthe camera, in the image above. This slides a small metal mask over the viewfinder. Cool!
But wait a minute! I can see the shutter lever in the front around the lens, but how do you wind the film on as there appears to be no way of doing so? This is arguably the one thing that makes the Agimatic very ‘unique.’ The shutter button on the front not only actuates the shutter but if you continue the downward motion of the button it actually winds the film on. Now that is very cool!
But wait there’s more. The film rewind is a little different too. The best way to appreciate this is by clicking on the image below and watching the video.
Now all I need is a suitable location to try the camera out. For this I visited the Spa Valley Railway in Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent, just an hours drive away.
It took me a while to get used to setting not only aperture and shutter speed but distance as well. The camera has two indicators showing that film is being wound on, both didn’t seem to be working. So I tried to open the camera up without exposing the film, and as the image below shows I wasn’t quite as successful as I thought. But at least I knew the film was indeed being wound on.
Shutter speeds range from b through to a blisteringly fast 1/300th second. Fast enough to stop this Diesel in its tracks.
Alongside the railway are the Eridge Rocks popular with climbers.
When reviewing my images I have to admit to being a little disappointed as they all seemed soft/out of focus due to my unfamiliarity with the camera. Then I got to the image below which offered me hope. It also revealed that with a little more care the images can be really sharp.
So I just had to try again!
That’s much better☺️
I some how managed a double exposure in the image below?
With a few of the images I applied a very small amount of sharpening.
With others a little more and still the sharpness is variable.
For the second film I mainly used f8 -16 and was more deliberate when focusing. Overall I’m relieved that the camera has the ability to turn out sharp results…when it wants to. I’m also pleased, as I really enjoyed the experience with this camera.
If I were really concerned about sharpness, then this camera would be a source of frustration. However I can embrace less sharpness and unpredictability, when the camera offers such an enjoyable experience as the Agimatic does in my opinion.
Yes there is enough interest in the camera to keep me coming back for more. Which I will definitely do, when the subject is appropriate.
arhphotographic 