First roll through my newest oldest camera. The Argus A was International Research Corporation's entry into the camera market, a cheap, lightweight, extremely simple 35mm viewfinder camera that appeared on the market in 1936 for the low price of $12.50 (about $250 in today's money)¹. Intended as an affordable alternative to the Kodak Retina and Leica models that had been available for a few years, the Argus A quickly became popular, selling over 200,000 copies in its five-year production run (and another 300,000 derivatives of the original A), and is widely regarded as having popularized the 35mm format in the United States.

My copy was made in 1939, according to the serial number, and it just needed a little oil on the shutter and it's working as well as any of these ever did. From a modern perspective, the A is completely feature-free even compared to the later Argus C3 (I also have one of those, and I will write about it here someday), with a collapsible 50mm ƒ/4.5 triplet lens, a between-the-lens shutter adjustable from 1/25 to 1/200s (plus B and T) and ƒ/4.5 to ƒ/11, and two fixed focus positions. The focus adjustment is difficult to use properly and most of my attempts at close-up shots failed. Also, a maximum exposure value of 14.5 (1/200s ƒ/11) is insufficient for modern high-speed film like Fomapan 200; next time I take this camera out I'm going to load up with something like Ilford PanF or RPX 25.

In terms of image quality, I think it's about what I'd expect from a pre-WWII optical design. Sharpness is actually pretty good when it's in focus, but there's some vignetting going on at ƒ/11 (probably why it doesn't go higher), what I believe to be internal reflections in the camera causing vignetting in the other direction, and then the uncoated lens elements are causing plenty of contrast issues. It's really a look you don't see much anymore.

Nevertheless, I'm quite happy with how these photos came out. I personally think the image quality issues are endearing, given as not even modern "bad cameras" produce quite the same results, and I'm really just impressed an eighty-three year old camera is still kicking with an absolute minimum of maintenance. I've got plenty of other tools in the toolbox if I need perfect results.