CASCA Cameras

The CASCA cameras of 1948-49

There were only two models of the Casca made by optical manufacturer Steinheil in Munich Germany and while their shape is very similar there are many differences between these two interesting cameras. With a heavy diecast body and large (for the time) viewfinder, lots of their features are quite individual and some are unique.

Casca II Casca I

The Casca I

Well you could say that it has very few features. Only six shutter speeds are available, from 1/25 to 1/1000, so there are no slow speeds. There is a B setting but no provision for a cable release. There is no flash synchronisation and no rangefinder. It has interchangeable lenses but you will need the accessory viewfinder when using them. Really it is basically just a very solid scale-focusing 35mm camera.

Casca I with accessory viewfinder for 3.5, 8.5 and 13.5 lenses

showing the back panel styling

Priced in the USA at $320 it was quite expensive at the time, around the same price bracket as a Leica. Or you could have bought a Kine-Exakta for $279, an SLR camera that offered far more features. Interestingly in 1948 USA a good new car cost about $1800. You could buy a Rolleiflex for $265, a 4x5 Speed Graphic for $249 and the new Polaroid 95 camera sold for $95. So the Casca I wouldn’t have been easy to sell. When the Casca II came onto the market soon afterwards it was better priced at $285.

The Casca I lenses attach via a 37mm bayonet mount and have a gear-toothed ring, which engages a gear wheel in the mount that rotates via another in the round housing on the front plate, which you use for focusing.

The standard lens is a Culminar 5cm f2.8. Two other Culminar lenses were offered, an 8.5cm f2.8 and a 13.5cm f4.5, as well as a 3.5cm f4.5 Orthostigmat.

Geared lens mount on Casca I

Focusing wheel on Casca I

The film advance knob also serves as a rewind knob when lifted and a smaller knob by the shutter release is moved to engage rewind, a feature that involves a complex set of gears. There is a swing-out foot on the base to enable the camera to stand level. Two buttons on the base need to be moved to first unlock and then open the back.

Common to both models are a focal-plane shutter with speeds set by a sliding bar on the rear, a top-hinged fully opening back, tripod socket, accessory shoe and fine leather covering. Also an individual lens mount that is not interchangeable between models and was never used by any other maker.

The Casca II

Now this is almost another camera, as it has all the features that you would expect from a serious-looking 35 and probably compared quite well on price and features with the market competition.

Casca II with f2 Quinon 5cm lens

It has a coupled rangefinder, with a moving spot in the viewfinder which now can show frame lines (in bright red) for the 8.5 and 13.5 lenses; each is selected by a lever on the top plate. There are nine shutter speeds from 1/2 to 1/1000 and B, so slow speeds are now available but there is still no cable release socket. Film rewind is by a separate knob; rewind is selected by rotating a collar around the shutter release which has a red dot that rotates as the film moves through. There is no swing-out foot on the base and only one button is needed to unlock and open the back that is now without the metal circle trim in the leather. It has flash synchronisation via two sockets on the base with a selector knob to choose five types of synchro: Photoflash 50 Vakublitz 1.2.M1 / Synchro-Press 5.11.22 / Speed Midget SM / Elektroflash / Focal Plane 31 Vakublitz M1. And as an option you could have an additional PC outlet on the front plate (shown in photo 1). Choices!

The lenses now use a quite different and again unique method of mounting; a circular groove has three opposing pairs of ball bearings which engage detents in the lens mount.

A very small rotation of about 10mm only is required to seat the lens into place. A new faster standard lens, the Quinon 5cm f2 was introduced and the same three other lenses as before now came in this mount.

Focusing these is by the conventional way of turning a ring around the lens mount and the 5cm lenses do not rotate. Two small knobs are helpfully provided on the 5cm and 3.5cm lenses. When focusing you turn them clockwise but with the 8.5 and 13.5 lenses you turn the ring anti-clockwise; strange!

Ball bearing lens mount on Casca II

An accessory viewfinder (with parallax correction, unlike the built-in frame finder) was available for using with the 3.5cm lens. Both Steinheil viewfinders continued to be made and sold as an accessory for use on other makes of cameras, some are even branded with other names. One variation of the 3.5 finder also has a 5cm frame line.

13.5cm and 8.5cm Culminar lenses

Casca II with Orthostigmat 3.5cm lens and accessory viewfinder

Steinheil offered a very nice zippered leather outfit case for the model II. Lined in green suede leather it had compartments to fit the camera with standard lens, the 3.5, 8.5 and 13.5 lenses, the 3.5 viewfinder, a lens hood, three containers of film, a lens cap and four filters. There is a tasselled cord in each filter slot for easy removal and identification, as they are individually coloured red, green, yellow and white. Neat!

The large Casca viewfinder makes the camera very nice to use when compared with those two other fine rangefinder 35’s of the time: Leica and Contax. The Leica M3 with bigger finder and framelines was not on the market until 1954. The Casca shutter fires smoothly and quietly much like a Leica. One reference says that Leitz claimed some patent infringements were made by Steinheil with the Casca, and with a change of ownership of the company, camera manufacture ceased after only two years and two models. With a total production of probably less than 2000 units the Casca is a fairly scarce camera. The camera’s name likely came from Carl August von Steinheil Camera.

Serial numbers:

Casca I - Camera numbers: 5xxxx Lens numbers: 50xxxx

Casca II - Camera numbers: 6xxxx Lens numbers: 59xxxx

The Steinheil company continued on as a lens maker into the 1970s producing optics for scientific and photographic use including enlarging lenses, projection lenses and binoculars Their lenses can be found fitted as standard to several cameras including the Paxette, Ilford Sportsman, Adox, Dollina, Dignette and Edixa; they also made their lenses in mounts to fit the Exacta and Leica screwmount.