The Leica III series

Leica III negra núm 159599 fabricada
el año 1935, también conocida como
Leica III f, óptica Elmar 5 cm f/ 3,5

Agustí Centelles i Ossó ya  disponía de una máquina Leica durante el año 1934, mi equipo ha estado consultado a expertos de la Leica Historical Society of America. Mi padre tuvo ocasión de descubrir la cámara Leica en el antiguo campo del F.C. Barcelona, viendo trabajar al fotoperiodista deportivo Ramón Claret i Artigas*


Centelles utilizó una Leica III, como la que se reproduce debajo, fue la última cámara diseñada por Oskar Barnak, que falleció el año 1935.

- The Leica III series -Introduced in 1933, the Leica III was Leitz's response to the introduction of the Zeiss-Ikon Contax.   It was also Oskar Barnack's last design before he died in 1935.   Unlike the Leica II, the Leica III includes an extended range of slow shutter speeds.   The added slow speeds range from 1/20th of second to one full second.
Underneath the top cover - both the Leica II and III share the basic body shell of the Leica I.   To produce this third variant, a separate front mounted dial was installed onto the front body shell of the Leica camera.   The Leica III camera uses the same RF/VF architecture as the Leica II.   Both the Leica II and III are fitted with a 1.5 magnifier to their rangefinder optics - but the III gets an adjustable diopter.An additional feature not found on the Leica II, the Leica III also has two lugs or eyelets added to the body for a camera strap.Aside from the extra front mounted shutter speed dial and the two lugs for a camera strap, the Leica III looks almost identical Leica II.   As a tribute Oskar Barnack's frugal genius, one body shell now served as the basic platform for the Leica I, II, and III.   E. Leitz could now sell 35mm cameras at three different price levels.   Any Leitz LTM lens with a focus cam could seamlessly couple with a sensor tab within the camera body of the RF apparatus built-in to both the Leica II and III.The front dial is only used to set the added slow shutter speed escapement.   The top shutter speed dial was still used in the same manner as the Leica II to set speeds faster than 1/20th of a second.   With the Leica III, the photographer could select shutter speeds between 1/500th of a second to 1 full second - versus the Leica II - which only ranged from 1/500th to 1/20th of a second.The Leica III received two updates:

• A Leica IIIa was released in 1935 and it added a top speed of 1/1000th of a second.

• A Leica IIIb was released in 1938 with a redesigned viewfinder optic, which brings the RF and VF eye pieces close together.

While it was an improvement over the Leica II, the Leica III still did not match its major competitor, which was the better specified Zeiss Ikon Contax.Fortunately for Leitz, the relatively uncomplicated horizontally moving, twin curtain, cloth focal plane shutter, that been designed with the Leica I in mind, proved to be very reliable even when extented to the Leica III.   On paper at least, the newly released Contax was a very impressive design, but its magnificent all-metal, roller blind shutter proved to be troublesome during its early years.

*Centelles in_edit_oh!, catálogo de la exposición de Nueva York / Salamanca, investigación y textos  de la doctoranda Rocío Alcalá del Olmo.