The Contaflex Beta was introduced by Zeiss in 1957 to bring the popular range of Contaflex SLR's to the masses.
Its stripped down design was available in two variants, the Alpha and the Beta. Both camera's use the same Pronto reflex shutter mounted between the lens, and both had a removable front element to allow the installation of 2 additional optics.
The whole range consisted of:-
Zeiss Pantar 30mm f4
Zeiss Pantar 45mm f2.8
Zeiss Pantar 75mm f4
These optics where also designed to be mounted on the Zeiss Contina III compact camera.
The alpha was supplied as a simple manual camera, where as the Beta was supplied with an in built selenium meter situated below the film rewind.
Although Been marketed as an affordable camera, the Contaflex Beta still had a price tag of over £100 in 1957 , based on inflation rates this is equivalent to nearly £2000 today!!!
The Contaflex Beta was much like all Zeiss products of the day, and was sold as part of a system, your original purchase brought you the camera, but with deep enough pockets you could indulge in an area of lenses, filters, close up accessories, flash guns and fitted cases.
Our system has been built up with such accessories and not only offers a photographic solution for almost any situation, it is also completely original from case to camera.
If you are looking to replicate the day to day photography of the late 50's to early 60's, then we could not think of a better kit to do so. The lens renders colour film beautifully and contributes in no small part to that unique palette of colours you associate with early colour pictures.
And despite its age, due to the fantastic build quality Zeiss insisted on with all its products, this camera still produces photo's that give many a modern camera a run for its money.
If you would like to know more about any cameras within the Contaflex range, there is a very informative web page on Wikipedia.