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I purchased a Konica FP SLR (vertical travel metal focal plane shutter, 1/125 flash sync -- oooh wow!) circa 1963 and it was a pretty awesome machine -- at least, after an Argus C3! It was purely manual and served me well to around 1980/81 when the shutter started acting up. Somewhere during that period I bought my dad a Konica rangefinder with auto exposure that was great optically but broke down in a disappointingly short time. No idea if that has anything to do with anything, but my impression is the brand was never around in the sort of quantities sold by Nikon and Canon.
I still have the FP but have never worked up the urge to try and get it repaired, assuming it is even possible. I'm pretty sure the lenses predated the 'AR' series, but I recall the 35mm 2.8 and the 52mm 1.4 being impressively sharp.
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Top quality stuff, the lenses especially, which are indeed of a very high standard. I saw them described once as "engineering driven" rather than "marketing driven," meaning that while they were quite innovative (first autofocus camera and first autoexposure SLR, for instance), they just expected everyone would beat a path to their door.
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I like their IRfilm.
Jeff
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 Originally Posted by henry finley
What IR film? News to me. Why do you like it?--that is to ask if its more an IR film like Kodak's used to be, or is it more like the ones that is only some small portion of IR sensitive, requiring a totally opaque filter and 40 stops of opening up the lens to get any infrared value out of it? You used to only need a 25A with Kodak to have a nearly 100% infrared film. Now that they are gone, I'd be all ears to hear a suitable replacement.
Konica USED to make an IR film - or maybe it was made by someone else and badged... I don't know.
It was a near IR film, like Ilford SFX - but it was based on a very fine grain film, so quite slow, but very fine grained. It was a superb film for IR portraits and figure work - it did amazing things to skin tones. I miss it 
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Last edited by Newt_on_Swings; 02-03-2013 at 08:43 PM. Click to view previous post history.
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I obtained several expired rolls of Konica 120 IR film a couple of years ago. It had expired around '93, but some of the rolls developed very nicely. I shot it using a red 25A filter, and developed it in D76.
I'm definitely a Konica camera fan, and have a couple of bodies (TC-X and an Autoreflex T3), and a number of lenses in my collection. I've noticed that the Konica groups on Flickr seem to be dominated by Asian shooters, so I suppose they were more popular outside the US. Konica glass does seem to be especially contrasty, in a good way.
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Konica had an excellent line up lens, all of which are very sharp. Several Japaness fans claim that the Japaness Government used Konica 50mms as the bench mark for evaluating all 35mm lens. I bought my first Konica T in 1969 with a 50mm 1.2, it was perhaps the best 50mm I have ever used. In 71 I traded in the T for a Nikon F because I needed a motor drive. The Ts have flash sync at 1/125th and full information view finder. The T 4 added a winder, not full motor drive, slowed the flash syn to 1/60, the FS and other bodies with build in winders were slow, did not have full information in the view finder, and I dont think were as rugged as the Ts. In the past couple of years I have collected a number of Konica bodies and a hand full of lens. I have tested the 50MM 1.8, 1.4 28 3.5 and 135 3.5 and 200mm F 4, the 200 is not the pro version. My testing shows all to be very sharp, as sharp or sharper than my Pentax M 42s and Canon FD primes I had. I use hearing aid batteries in the T3, meters well.
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My grandfather was an avid nature (mostly flower, some bird and general wilderness) photographer, and consequently put together a large macro- and long-lens system around an Autoreflex T2. I rescued it from his basement a couple of years ago and have been gradually getting it back into service for my girlfriend, who is also fond of macro. I've been favourably impressed. The shutter release isn't as nice as my Pentaxen, because part of the auto-exposure mechanism is driven by the initial press of finger on shutter button. The same is true of the Olympus 35RC, and, I expect, other early electro-mechanical auto-exposure cameras. In other respects, though, it's a solid and comfortable camera with lenses that I've never heard any complaints about. I certainly don't have any.
I've already got a 35mm SLR system and don't need another, but otherwise I'd cheerfully keep and use the Konica.
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I've owned a couple of Konica SLRs. Nice cameras but nothing to distinguish themselves and push them ahead in a very crowded field.
I still have a Konica Autoreflex T - a full-size all-manual camera.
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how about Konica film? What happened to that? I didn't even know they had made film until about a week ago I bumped into some Konica IR stuff in a darkroom fridge.
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