The Nicca Camera Co. Ltd. started as the optical workshop Kōgaku Seiki Co. in 1940, founded by former employees of

Canon Canon or Canons may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Canon (fiction), the conceptual material accepted as official in a fictional universe by its fan base * Literary canon, an accepted body of works considered as high culture ** Western ca ...

. Its first camera, the Nippon, a close copy of the Leica rangefinder camera, was produced in 1942. In 1948, the company changed its name to the Nippon Camera Works, and a year later, to the Nicca Camera Works. It continued to build Leica-type rangefinder cameras, adding such features as flash synchronization, lever wind, a hinged film back, and projected viewfinder framing. Nicca also made cameras for

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began a ...

under the Tower name. In 1958, the company was acquired by

Yashica Yashica was a Japanese manufacturer of cameras, originally active from 1949 until 2005 when its then-owner, Kyocera, ceased production. In 2008, the Yashica name reappeared on cameras produced by the Hong Kong-based MF Jebsen Group. In 2015, tr ...

, which manufactured and re-labeled the Nicca-33 and III-L as the Yashica YE and YF respectively.

External links

history
{{From Camerapedia, Nicca Photography companies of Japan