C41
Kodak Portra 400
Kodak Portra 400 is a professional C-41 color negative film known for flexible exposure latitude, natural skin tones, and fine grain.
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The Rolleiflex 2.8A (1949) is the founding model of Rollei's f/2.8 TLR line, introduced to sit above the established 3.5 series. It was the first production Rolleiflex to offer a maximum aperture of f/2.8, pairing a **Carl Zeiss Tessar 80mm f/2.8** four-element taking lens with a Compur-Rapid leaf shutter. The body retains the crank-wind film advance and waist-level finder of the mature Rolleiflex design, and exposes 12 frames of 6x6 cm on 120 roll film. No built-in meter; exposure is fully manual.
Reference
Recommended film stocks for the — format your camera takes.
C41
Kodak Portra 400 is a professional C-41 color negative film known for flexible exposure latitude, natural skin tones, and fine grain.
View profile →BW
Kodak Tri-X 400 is a classic black-and-white film known for strong tonality, visible grain, and documentary character.
View profile →BW
Ilford HP5 Plus is a flexible ISO 400 black-and-white film with classic grain and strong push-processing tolerance.
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About this camera
The first f/2.8 Rolleiflex: Rollei's 1949 answer to portrait and low-light medium-format photography.
| Field | Value |
|---|
| Format | 120 (6x6 cm) |
| Taking lens | Carl Zeiss Tessar 80mm f/2.8 (4 elements / 3 groups) |
| Viewing lens | ~ 80mm f/2.8 Heidosmat |
| Years | 1949-1952 |
| Shutter | 1s - 1/500s + B, Compur-Rapid leaf |
| Flash sync | X-sync |
| Meter | None |
| Film advance | Crank |
| Lens mount | Bay II |
Rollei introduced the 2.8A in 1949, building on the prewar Rolleiflex body design. The rationale was commercial: portrait and available-light photographers wanted a faster lens than the f/3.5 Tessar offered by the contemporary Rolleiflex Automat, and the f/2.8 Tessar was the fastest four-element formula Zeiss could supply in this focal length at the time.
Production ran approximately three years before the 2.8B superseded it. Rollei's engineers determined that a six-element design -- the Planar or the Schneider Biometar -- provided meaningfully better wide-open correction than the Tessar formula at f/2.8, and the 2.8B made the switch.
The 2.8A body uses Bay II filter fittings, shared with the 3.5-series of the same era.
The 2.8A is the starting point of Rollei's flagship TLR lineage that would run through the 2.8B, 2.8C, 2.8D, 2.8E, 2.8F, and ultimately the 2.8GX. Its significance is primarily historical: it was the first commercially successful TLR to offer f/2.8 on medium format, a specification that defined the premium end of the 6x6 market for a generation.
The Tessar formula at f/2.8 performs differently from the later Planar -- sharper on-axis at moderate apertures, but with less correction at the wide-open setting that was the reason for the faster lens in the first place. Users who shoot the 2.8A stopped down to f/5.6 are essentially using the same effective image quality as the 3.5 Automat; the f/2.8 advantage only becomes clear near wide-open.
C41
Kodak Portra 160 is a professional C-41 color negative film with fine grain, soft contrast, and natural color.
View profile →Rollei 2.8A
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