Kodak Vigilant Six-16

Format

616

System

Kodak Vigilant

Shutter

Kodex, Diomatic, Kodamatic or Supermatic; post-war examples Flash Kodamatic or Flash Supermatic

Metering

none

Spec Notes

The wholly new 1939 body: 'The smoothly operating body shutter release is automatically retracted as the camera closes'; 'You can sight on your subject from either eye level or waist level, for the Vigilants have both direct-view and reflecting finders'; 'New safety back latch'; self-erecting front. FILM ADVANCE IS MANUAL, BY RED WINDOW - that is the whole of what separates a Vigilant from a Monitor, and it is why the Monitor is a separate row. A SHUTTER SUBSTITUTION WITHIN THE RUN, sourced from Kodak's own catalogues a year apart and corroborated by two surviving instruction books: the Kodex rungs of Oct-1939 are Diomatic rungs by 1940. Folded as a generation, not split - one dimension. AA-13 ends the Six-16 in 1942 and the Six-20 in 1949, a seven-year divergence inside one named line, consistent with 616 being dropped during the war; no Kodak statement of cause was located. LENS AND SHUTTER ARE AN OPTION LADDER, NOT SEPARATE MODELS. Kodak's catalogues print one heading and one description per camera with a price table of lens-and-shutter combinations underneath, and AA-13 carries one row per camera rather than one per grade. DATING: PARTIAL, AND ONLY THROUGH THE LENS. From about 1940 a Kodak Ektar, Anastigmat Special or Anastar carries the CAMEROSITY two-letter year prefix on its serial (C=1 A=2 M=3 E=4 R=5 O=6 S=7 I=8 T=9 Y=0). This camera was sold with such a lens inside that window, so an example wearing one can be dated FROM THE LENS - which dates the LENS, not the body, and lenses were swapped in service. Examples on the cheaper rungs carry no code at all. The body has no serial scheme.

Fitted Lens

Kodak Anastigmat f/8.8, f/6.3 or f/4.5, or Kodak Anastigmat Special f/4.5

Rangefinder

No

Negative Size

2 1/2 x 4 1/4 in

Alternate Names

—

Introduced

1939