Ricohflex Model IIII

 

Continuing with interesting looking cameras, this post will be going over the Ricoh camera range. This post is all about the Ricohflex Model IIII.

As usual, I will first go over the camera company’s history. The Ricoh camera company started in 1936 in Japan, Tokyo by Kiyoshi Ichimura, who was a “remarkable visionary who championed a responsible, progressive, and people-first approach to doing business. Mr Ichimura recognised the importance of embracing human potential to create a better future for our people and planet…” (Ricoh 2025).

The company first started as Rikagaku Kogyo, a company started by the “Institute of Physical and Chemical Research to commercialize the fruits of its R&D” and sensitized paper in 1927 and then changed its name to Riken Kankoshi Co., Ltd. in 1936, then to Riken Optical Co., Ltd two years later and by 1963 to Ricoh Company, Ltd. (Ricoh Media).

When the company went by Riken Kankoshi Co., Ltd. when the sensitized paper division split under the directorship of Ichimura and “led the successful development of the business that started with 350,000 yen in capital and a staff of 33…” (Ricoh Media).

The company only started selling cameras in 1937 and in “1950, it created Japan’s first mass production structure for cameras, driving their popularity among consumers. The company entered the business machine field in 1955 by launching the Ricopy 101…” (Ricoh Media).

Ricopy 101. Image Source: https://www.ricoh.com/-/Media/Ricoh/Sites/com/about/company/history/2000/img/copy_01.jpg

The key to their success was the fact that Ricoh was the first company to introduce the conveyer belt system “achieving a production capacity of 10,000 units/month —more than ten times the capacity of the then standard level of less than 1,000 units/month from the conventional handicraft industry…” which lead to the Ricohflex Model IIIB to be created in mass production(Camera-wiki) leading to it being more affordable and a big hit with the public, “representing more than 50% of total national camera production during its sales peak…” (Ricoh Media). This mass camera production led to them receiving the Ohkochi Memorial Production Prize in 1957 (Ricoh.com). 

Ricohflex Model IIIB. Image Source: https://p1-d9ebd2ee.imageflux.jp/c!/w=1280,h=1280,a=0,u=1,q=75/101048/1723170986882.jpg

In 1955 the company released the Ricopy 101, their first office copier. It became a popular item and even received the “Mechanical Engineering Heritage Certification No.54 for fiscal year 2012.” Then by 1962, the paper plant in Numazu (1960) was expanded to include the sensitized paper production. In that same year led to the Ohmori Plant and the General Research Lab, which helped “served as strong Ricoh bases to support expansion of its business areas of microphotography cameras, o‑set printers, data processing systems, and many others…” (Ricoh Media).

This led to Ricoh to venture into the automatic cameras, creating the Ricoh Auto-35 (the first camera with an electric-eye made in Japan) and the Ricoh Auto-Half (a more advance system with automatic film-rewind, focus and exposure). These cameras were easy to use and “purse-sized” which made them popular, especially among the female populace. This same year also saw the founding of the USA branch: Ricoh Industries, U.S.A. Inc. (Ricoh.com). This led to their 10-million-yen sales milestone leading to the name change of Ricoh Company, Ltd. in 1963 (Ricoh Media) and also the founding of the European branch in Switzerland (Ricoh.com).  

Ricoh Auto-35. Image Source: https://farm5.static.flickr.com/4054/4653634054_44d699f75f.jpg

Ricoh Auto-Half. Image Source: https://cdn.assets.lomography.com/da/acdd28f0730006b46608fa371ec82cf565fd39/1216x912x2.jpg?auth=3d26372ec45511d061302c9ba93c97ec2b1f9a86

This led to them wanting to make further leaps in the industry, but business started to fade but came back when they brought out their first electrostatic copier, the Ricopy BS-1 (Ricoh Media). The next two years saw the opening of two factories in two other prefectures in Japan and in 1968, the death of Kiyoshi Ichimura (Ricoh.com). 

Ricopy BS-1. Image Source: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CQyj1gYU8AA79FS.jpg:large

In the 1970s, the company opened Ricoh of America, Inc. through the integration of the Ricoh Industries, U.S.A. Inc., and throughout the 1970-1984, released more office equipment, factories in different Japanese prefectures and even one in Germany and California USA. They also established new subsidiaries (like Imaging Technology) and even had mergers with the Ricoh of America, Inc. and Rapicom, Inc. This period also saw the death of another company president, Mikio Tatebayashi (Ricoh.com). 

From 1985-1999, saw the company still grow. Creating more office equipment, which won them twenty-one more awards, more international offices in France, USA, Russia, UK, India, Italy, Spain and China, as well as more factories in other Japanese prefectures. This period also saw the Ricoh company entering the CD industry and producing its first digital camera, the Ricoh DC-1 in 1995, which won the Camera Grand Prix '95 Special Prize in Japan (Ricoh.com).  

Ricoh DC-1. Image Source: https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSmJwsvcdj6GbJUhUnjZkY62orgVZ85Y2R6yA&s

This growth just wouldn’t stop. In 2000-2010, the company got more awards, opened more international and prefecture offices, more advanced office and camera equipment. They even inaugurated the Ichimura Nature School Kanto for youth education and development, joined the UN Global Compact, joined a partner agreement with the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation, Janan and even became the sponsor for the Woman’s British Open international golf tournament (Ricoh.com). 

Then by 2010 and onwards, Ricoh’s: “range of value provided to customers has begun to expand significantly. Ricoh launched the Projection System business in 2010, the United Communication System business in 2011 and the Additive Manufacturing (AM) business in 2014, coupled with the introduction of various network appliances linked to cloud services. In 2013, we released RICOH THETA, the world's first digital camera capable of taking fully spherical pictures. These are some of the many ways Ricoh creates new value for its customers…”

This period saw more awards (shocker!), factories and subsidiaries. It even entered the health care industry and became more environmentally conscious, while still innovating in the world of office and school equipment. Their most notable achievements (notable to me anyway) is that it bought and acquired the Pentax brand in 2011 and releasing the Ricoh GR (Kaninsky), brought out the RICOH THETA, a “product capable of capturing the scene around, above and below the device in a fully spherical image…” and the RICOH-SV-M-S1, “an industrial stereo camera which can take accurate and speedy 3D measurements…” as well as many more impressive cameras and camera equipment (Ricoh.com).  Please do check out the Ricoh timeline: https://www.ricoh.com/about/history for the full story. 

Ricoh GR. Image Source: https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQjQpOgHvQgXZsDmrgwiBCdCWcXgWaqn1ADsLbF47Z6iHZ6nbCZhpgX5FVcuis8hnhY4XU&usqp=CAU

Ricoh Theta. Image Source: https://cameralandsandton.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/ricoh-theta-x-8-768x495-1-1.jpg

Ricoh-SV-M-S1. Image Source: https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQlT_xjVMZCFfWQxj5zkk9LZFx1E7lnR-gPng&s

It really seems like the Ricoh name isn’t going away anytime soon and that nothing will stand in the way of this powerhouse!

But anyway, now for the main event: a look at the camera of this post, the Ricohflex Model IIII. 

The Ricohflex Model IIII was produced 1952 (Erker). What is interesting is that this camera is the second in the series, despite the first one being labelled as Model III (Pantax 2021).

Ricohflex Model III. Image Source: https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2702/4517454296_6d328e0fcd_m.jpg

It seems that the Model IIII was part of the conveyer belt system that developed the Model IIIB, the second variation of the Model III (SpyZee).

What I find interesting about the Model IIII is that since it came out in the 1950s, its full name is technically Riken Optical Co., Ltd Ricohflex Model III camera, as proven by the date and the fact that the lens cap has the name Riken on it.

The second piece is that this camera is the early version of the Model IIII, because “Earlier ones are labelled IIII which was later changed to the more correct Roman Numeral IV…” (Erker).

Ricohflex Model IV. Image Source: https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/bmc-penny-images/production/1200/10.40.07-2ba1847e29db4d0314d4f2eb413d28bf.jpeg

This camera was followed up with the Model VI (Camera-wiki), a Model V was never made (TLRgraphy 2012), making the Model IIII (or IV) a part of Ricoh’s “19 TLRs, albeit some of them are remarkably like each other. Its TLRs span the near bottom of the market and a few quite high-end models…” (SpyZee).

Ricohflex Model VI by David Donnadieu. Image Source: https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3391/3259016770_de827edf5b_m.jpg

It appears that there is no difference between the different models. The only differences seem to be that certain models have faster shutter speeds, f/stop settings and film advance wind knobs, like the Ricohflex Holiday (Erker). 

Ricohflex Holiday. Image Source: https://i.etsystatic.com/13173561/r/il/c488c9/4635822556/il_1080xN.4635822556_cqza.jpg

But comparing the Model III to the Model IIII, I can’t really see any difference. Both have the same type of lenses, f/stops and shutter speeds (Spyzee), except for the first Model III, which had the smallest f/stop at 16 (the Model IIII is 22), but later models of the Model III came with the 22 setting (TLRgraphy 2012). 

Another difference is that the Model IIII has “a folding viewfinder shade which was changed to the pop-up type” which was introduced when the Model IIIB was made (TLRgraphy 2012).

It looks more like the Model IIIB and IIII/IV could be the same. My theory is that the Model III was popular and when Ricoh used the conveyer belt system, they possibly felt that naming the new camera model IIIB didn’t fit their brand of being the company that made new luxury models with their new method of producing cameras, so they made the Model IIIB, but renamed it the Model IIII and then renamed it the Model IV to the correct roman numeral. But this is just my theory, so I could be wrong.

Now the only difference I can find between the Model IIII and the VI, is that VI came with a red film counter window (Erker).

Now time to look at the camera itself. The body is “made from sheet steel with a thicker steel lens plate…” (Erker) and covered in snakeskin leatherette. It has a weight of approximately 453g (BlueMoon) and 5” (7 when viewfinder is unfolded) x 2.7” x 2,9” in size.

Now for the front of the camera.

First the lenses.

The lenses are similar to the Eugen Ising Pucky I Flex Camera, except the Model IIII is a real TLR with a geared lens (Camera-wiki).

I do go over what a TLR is in my Pucky I post, but I will give a brief overview:

“A twin lens reflex (TLR) camera is a type of camera that features two lenses: one for capturing the image on film and another for the finder. This lens reflex camera offers an alternative experience in photography to the standard film camera. Pioneering models like the Rolleiflex and Mamiya C series have been instrumental in the camera makers’ industry. These cameras mostly used 120 film, with fixed lens setups such as the 80mm tessar lens. A few later models, like the Mamiya c220, introduced interchangeable lenses. The camera body often has controls for shutter speed and aperture, enabling the adjustment of depth of field. Using a TLR entails looking down into the top of the camera through the viewfinder, which contains a reflex mirror. The image seen in the viewfinder is reflected from the front of the camera and behind the viewing lens…” (Photoco 2025).

Rolleiflex. Image Source: https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/UwzbuvZS6eAJjUq346fa2PqUl0lV0vqPTvCZhihNdaHEqJGQeeBRc5pK8BZ_ejY2cnMMNRfghrMyeO6cfgsVSoIm5cuctYT9nGzoc7_7kiiiMAizzurb

Mamiya C220. Image Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/62/Mamiya_C220front.JPG

Or: “the TLR employs two lenses of the same focal length, arranged one above the other. The lower lens is the ‘taking’ lens, while the upper lens is the viewing lens, behind which is a fixed mirror set at 45-degrees to reflect the image up to a focusing screen. The mirror accounts for the word “reflex” and the twin lens arrangement were designed to give a viewfinder image that was remarkably close to the one that was recorded by the taking lens. There is some parallax error – the slight difference in the two lenses’ fields of view – but it was negligible when focusing over long distances. It was more of an issue when shooting close-up, but many TLRs had a moving indicator in the viewfinder to show the difference in framing…” (Burrows 2021). 

So, unlike an SLR, which the viewfinder is connected to the lens, the TLR has two separate lenses that are the same and when focusing one, the other focuses at the same time and with the Model IIII, it is done through a gear system.

Both are most likely 3 element coated as well (Erker), talked about in the Polaroid SX-70 Land Camera post.

Now let’s look at each lens individually, starting with the viewer lens.

It is a Ricoh Viewer, with a focal length of 80mm and a maximum aperture of 1:3.5. It is also most likely an anastigmat lens (which is discussed in Agfa Billy Record 7.7 Pocket Camera post). But through further research, I suspect that the Ricoh Viewer is similar, if not the same, as the Triver Anastigmat lens found on the Ricohflex B from 1941 (Camera-wiki).

 

Ricohflex B. Image Source: https://www.collection-appareils.fr/ricoh/images/Ricohflex_Mod_B_face.jpg

This is also where the focus range settings are set. It can be set between 3.5-60 feet and infinity.

Now for the taking lens.

This is obviously like the viewer lens. An anastigmat lens with a maximum aperture of 3.5 and a focal length of 80mm. The only real difference between the two lenses is that the taking lens is where the shutter speed and f/stop settings and the aperture peddles are set.

Speaking of...

The shutter is bottom left.

 

It is a different type of shutter lever. By this I mean its method of preventing any accidental double exposure. To use the shutter, one must lift the shutter lever to cock the mechanism. According to the Model VIIs manual, “The convenient design of the Ricohflex shutter combines the setting and tripping lever in one unit.” Then once it is set, the user presses down on the lever to take the picture. 

The shutter is a leaf-shutter, specifically a Riken shutter, which means that it is synchronized for flash photography (Camera-wiki).

The shutter speed settings are found above the taking lens and behind the gear TLR system, on the outer ring. It has the setting speeds of 1/25, 1/50, 1/100 of a second and a B setting.

Above the lever is the Cable Release Socket, for remote shutter release cable.

Then on the other side of the taking lens…

Is the PC flash connector, with a pin (see Eugen Ising Pucky I Flex Camera for more information).

Underneath that is the f/stop settings, with the settings being 3.5, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16 and 22. The aperture peddles, like the Agfa Billy Record 7.7 Pocket Camera and The Utility Falcon Model F, are behind the shutter.

On top - 

Is the viewfinder, with a “self-erecting and closing hood” where the 45-degree angle mirror is to look through the viewer lens, which is manufactured from ground glass. The hood is used to help block out light and have the user see the image better. It is used the same as the brilliant finders on the Kodak Brownie Model 1 and the Brownie No. 2 Model D, meaning that it is viewed from the user’s hip.

The viewfinder also comes with a Wide Field Magnifier, which is built into the hood and is used for occasions when lighting is too distracting for viewing on the hip, or if the mirror is out of focus, by looking directly into the magnifier.

“To use the magnifier, look through the magnifying lens to the rear of the hood with one eye, while observing the subject with the other eye. The eye looking through the magnifier sees two thin white outlines. The large square outline shows the limits of the field, when 12O film is used; the small rectangular outline shows the field covered by 35mm film, used in the RICOHKIN ADAPTER…” according to the Model VII manual. 

On the left side…

Is the film advance winder knob, which like the Brownie cameras, also holds the film carrier in place and is released by pulling the knob outwards.

There are also the studs. There is one on either side and this is where the strap would go.

Underneath…

Is the tripod socket and the Rear catch and lock that keeps the film compartment cover closed.

Speaking of which, the back…

This is where the film compartment cover is. On the cover is the film counter window and the window cover.

As mentioned, the later Ricohflex models had red windows and the Model IIII seems to have a yellowish window.

In the film compartment is the film carrier, that takes twelve 6 x 6 pictures with 120 film (see Agfa Clack Film camera for more information) and is easy to load. It is similar to the Brownies and the Pucky I.

Although according to Erker, a Ricohkin or Color Adapter, can be used to allow the camera to use 35mm film.

The Model IIII might not be as advanced as the other TLR cameras, but it is simple and easier to use and is a good introduction for photographers (yes, even better than the Eugen Ising Pucky I Flex Camera) who want to get into the TLR camera game. Just found it a bit frustrating because of how limited the information about this camera is out there.

But anyway, thank you for making it to the end. And as always, I hoped you enjoyed this as much as I did researching it.

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List of sources:

BlueMoon. Ricoh Ricohflex Model IV Twin Lens Reflex Camera. https://bluemooncamera.com/shop/product/RED0120%7C118155C/ricoh-ricohflex-model-iv-twin-lens-reflex-camera?srsltid=AfmBOopGlMCFjusJs_o2ogsmdvqJG8U6RDfmqg_PatJiEyaMIC_ZqjZe

Burrows, P. 2021. The rise and fall of the TLR: why the twin-lens reflex camera is a real classic. https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/features/the-rise-and-fall-of-tlr-cameras-why-the-twin-lens-reflex-is-a-real-classic

Mike. Ricohflex VII Manual. https://butkus.org/chinon/ricoh/ricohflex_vii/ricohflex_vii.htm

Camera-wiki. Ricohflex B. http://camera-wiki.org/wiki/Ricohflex_B

Camera-wiki. Ricohflex (geared lens). http://camera-wiki.org/wiki/Ricohflex_(geared_lens)

Erker, G. Ricohflex / Diacord / Ricohmatic 6x6 TLRs. https://www.angelfire.com/ca/erker/ricohflex.html

Kaninsky, M. History of Pentax. https://aboutphotography.blog/blog/history-of-pentax-ricoh-imaging

Pantax. 2021. Ricohflex Model III Medium Format TLR. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjIHyB9Y2SM

Photoco. 2025. The Art of the Twin lens Reflex Camera: A Complete Guide for Photographers. https://photococamera.com/the-art-of-the-twin-lens-reflex-camera-a-complete-guide-for-photographers/#:~:text=A%20twin%20lens%20reflex%20(TLR,and%20behind%20the%20viewing%20lens.

Ricoh. 2025. Our History. https://www.ricoh.co.za/about-us/our-company/#:~:text=Ricoh%20was%20formed%20in%201936,from%20experts%20across%20our%20industry.

Ricoh.com. Company History. https://www.ricoh.com/-/Media/Ricoh/Sites/com/about/company/history/pdf/1936_1969/all.pdf

Ricoh Media. Company History. https://www.ricoh.com/about/history

Spyzee. Riken's Ricoh TLRs. http://www.tlr-cameras.com/japanese/Ricoh.html

TLRgraphy. 2012. Collection: Ricoh. https://tlrgraphy.com/tag/ricohflex/