I first became aware of the existence of a folding camera bearing an embossed mark, very similar to the Ilford Selo film brand name, when a gentleman named Richard Wellborne contacted me in July 2009. He was wishing to sell the camera shown below and asked me if I had any information about it. He has given permission for me to show these pictures on my web site.  'Selo' was long used as an Ilford film trade name (1920s to 1960s) and the horizontal diamond surround to the word Selo (see camera picture, below left) is very similar to how Ilford applied the Selo name (see film box, left). The main difference seems to be that 'Selo' was usually written (by Ilford) using upper case letters, whereas the embossed name on the camera below uses lower case. But in both cases, the word is written within a horizontal diamond shape.
The shutter is an AGC - being Alfred Gauthier Calmbach. They were founded in 1902 and started building shutters in 1904. They took over production of Compur shutters in 1970. The Pronto shutter on this Selo camera is a simple 'self-tensioning' type i.e. there is no pre-tensioning cocking lever; the shutter springs are tensioned by the first part of the downward movement of the shutter release lever. The 'Selo' girl in my web page picture is holding a folding camera, but this is believed to be a Kodak 620 (made around 1935), not a Selo. This makes the existence of Selo branded cameras even more mysterious. Why, if a Selo camera existed, did Ilford choose to advertise their film by showing a young lady holding a Kodak camera ?! Adding to this mystery is this website, where another folding camera is shown, also bearing the Selo name within a horizontal diamond outline. In this case, the name Selo is written in capital letters. For pictures copied from that site, see below. Did Ilford make some sponsorship payment to a continental camera manufacturer (like Balda, who made cameras for others to rebrand) to secure advertising for their Selo film brand during the 1930s? |