Voigtländer Vitessa

The Vitessa was one of the most innovative designs for a 35mm film camera from Voigtländer. Made since the early 50s for about a decade, ideas and filosophy behind this camera were bound to be part of the evolution on photo camera design.

The Vitessa was made in four different versions, all of them sharing the same body and one of the most important fatures of the camera: the "combi-plunger", a peculiar advance system for this camera that performs a double function, advance the film and cock the shutter.

Vitessa A:

There were five variations of this model. The first version was made without detachable back so that pressure plate was part of the camera and not part of the back. Has also a detachable flash shoe on the top cover and has no strap lugs. From the second variation, the back with the pressure plate is fully detachable, using screw-in filters for the lenses and the Compur-Rapid shutter is flash synched. Parallax compensation is manual for models A1 and A2, and automatic from the A3. Since the A4 model, the top shoe is fixed and a flash connector is available at the front door.

Vitessa N:

There were three different versions of the Vitessa N, all of them with Synchro-Compur LVS shutter, self-timer and EV scale from 3 to 18, flash connector on the door and automatic parallax correction. Has strap lugs, fixed flash shoe and lenses can be Ultron 50/2 or Color-Skopar 50/3.5

Vitessa L:

There were five variations of this model, with Synchro-Compur LVS shutter, self-timer and EV scale graduated from 2 to 18. Flash connector on the door and automatic parallax correction. Has strap lugs, fixed flash shoe and adds a lightmeter (with ABCDEF ASA 6-200 reading on early units, and BCDEFG ASA 12-400 later)

Vitessa T:

This is not really a bellows camera, since the body was redesigned and now the Vitessa has a rigid body capable of taking interchangeable lenses. It is fitted with a lightmeter, and 42,123 units were made in three main variations.

By the end of the 60s, merged with Zeiss-Ikon, the latter made a series of cameras bearing the Vitessa name (the 500 series), on which the remnants of what once was known as Voigtländer only made the lenses.

Color-Skopar is a Tessar clone (therefore, 4-elements in 3-groups), while the marvelous and better corrected Ultron has 6 elements on 4 groups. Minimum aperture is f/16, and lens has unit focusing allowing a more precise adjustment.

The viewfinder, combined with the rangefinder, shows the composition at an approximately 2/3 ratio. The rangefinder is always coupled, using a wheel located in the rear part of the camera, which sometimes is mistakenly taken for the advance wheel.

It is quite a compact camera, weigthing about 600 grams and a size of approximately 40x70x133mm - or 60x70x133mm when opened.

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