This beautiful jewel of a camera was purchased in early 1954 by a man of excellent taste who thoughtfully carved his name and address into the satin chrome top beside the fine built-in dual-range light meter.
Naturally, this added feature severely reduces the value of the camera to the serious collector. This is probably the reason I like it so much. I suppose I'm just not that serious.
This camera's shutter will not fire unless film is loaded and advanced to the next frame. There are a number of small, often overlooked features as well. The film advance is located on the bottom left and conveniently couples to another film advance knob fixed in the leather carrying case. The frame counter is also located on the bottom as is the film rewind. The coupled rangefinder is based upon the rotating prism design used in other models like the Super Ikonta. Its single combined view and rangefinder window is bright and the second central image is provided with a contrasting yellow filter to make framing and focusing especially easy.
Once I became accustomed to the ergonomics of this classic camera, it was a pleasure to use. While walking about the Bronx arboretum several young people stopped me to ask about the camera. Sort of like meeting new people while walking a puppy on the street. ... and the meter looks good but doesn't work. I have replaced it with my Voigtlander VC meter that conveniently mounts on the accessory shoe.
Finally, this camera is often refered to as the "Contessa-35", a name that was not used by ZI in the contemporary literature provided with the camera. It was simply called The Contessa.
