Graphic 35 ad
Sept 1956 Pop Photo
Toronto. In 1955 Graflex entered the 35mm market with their own brand calling the camera a Graphic 35. This was a few years after the first foray into 35mm film territory when Graflex bought out the Ciro camera company.
The camera used two marketing strategies: two handed focus buttons, a set up that, like Ford’s Edsel automobile, used a unique way to operate a major function – in this case focussing the lens with camera body buttons rather than a ring on the lens itself. And secondly by hopping on the colour bandwagon.
The focussing buttons were never adopted by others – a telling opinion of the feature. In the early sixties, the Graphic 35 Jet came out. The buttons were still used to focus but they moved the focal plane instead of the lens to focus!
Thanks to George Dunbar for finding this advertisement from the September 1956 issue of Popular Photography.
