The Iso-Rapid was released on the market in the mid 1960s. It took a special auto-load 35 mm cassette which took a picture measuring 24 mm square on CT18 film. Some camera collectors refer to the Iso-Rapid as Agfa's answer to the Kodak Instamatic, competing as it did in the low cost, point and shoot market. Yet it might be argued that Agfa had been knocking at the door of the simple to use auto-load with its Karat Cassettes prior to WWII. These were the forerunner of the Rapid cassette.

Before you send an email to the editor complaining about the terrible colour shift which accompanies the illustarations on this page, let me explain. Over the years, the film which was used with this camera has become very unstable in retaining certain hues of the colour spectrum. Hence the startling appearance of the three images has noting to do with electronic scanning.
This Iso-Rapid was owned by an unknown photographer who would surely have to qualify as one of the worst to ever have held a camera. I say this because of the negatives and transparencies, which were left on our doorstep along with the Iso-Rapid several years ago, less than 1% didn't end up on the tip. Normally I can force myself to see merit in a much larger proportion from such a vast collection, but in this case I had great difficulty in keeping 30 out of about 3,000.

What I did keep are historically important, like the Queen leaving the children's ward at Wellington Hospital, or the aftermath of the Wahine storm on a neighbour's fence. However the prize of this small assortment came in the form of a selection of pictures taken at a party. Here the use of the Iso-Rapid pop-up flash came into play. Sadly, as you can see, the photographer's aim is not all it should be. However, these and several others wonderfully recall the period when the men sat on one side and the women congregated in another part of the room.

As a footnote, we have been able to load some of these images onto our negative scanner at the Centre and apply corrections, which see some resemblance of normality returning to the images. However, in this instance we think it would serve the greater interests of the photographic community to show these pictures in their true condition. It might act as a caution for those who don't keep their negatives and transparencies housed properly in a stable environment.

Please note that articles by Bill Main introducing these cameras (and more) have been published by The Photographer's Mail, Auckland, New Zealand.

© Copyright by Bill Main