Dial 35 by Bell & Howell

Right a bit of an oddball here a clockwork auto winding half frame 35mm camera that I really like made by canon and re-badged for Bell & Howell. It has a photo cell around the lens that works the lightmeter and it looks really cool and takes nice images. With it being half frame you get 72 shots on a 36 exposure film. It can be used in manual mode by pulling out a button under the viewfinder. It was introduced in 1963 and looked quite space age with its odd shape for the time. The images are good for a half frame camera as with making a smaller negative you can loose some of the quality when you enlarge the image.

But I do like using this camera as people still notice you using it…. It’s great for street photography ( more info )

dial 35 photo

The Canon Dial 35 was an unconventional half-frame 35mm camera with clockwork automatic film advance. It was made in Japan by Canon from November 1963. The Dial 35 was also sold as the Bell & Howell Dial 35. The body had an unusual “portrait” format rectangular shape, with a short, wide-diameter lens barrel containing the CdS meter photocells window around the 28mm lens. Rotating the lens barrel set the speed of the Seikosha shutter; the aperture was set automatically. A button below the viewfinder could be pulled out to give manual aperture control, for manual exposure settings or flash. Film speed was set on a scale around the meter window. Focus was set on a lever around the top of the lens barrel, with a display inside the viewfinder. There was a cylindrical handle at the bottom, which also wound the clockwork mechanism. On the (user’s) left is an accessory shoe. The film ran vertically, from the cassette at the top to the take-up spool at the bottom, giving a landscape-format 24×18mm frame when the camera is upright.

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