Bronica

Bronica or Zenza Bronica (ゼンザブロニカ) was a Japanese brand of medium format roll-film cameras, including rangefinder and single-lens reflex models.

Bronica cameras first appeared in 1958, when the company's founder, Zenzaburo Yoshino, introduced a camera of his own design, the Bronica Z rollfilm camera, at the Philadelphia Camera Show. The name "Zenza Bronica" is reputedly derived from Zenzaburo Brownie Camera. The Bronica Z and successor Bronicas, using large-coverage, high-quality Nikkor lenses, became instant successes.

Bronica later introduced lenses of its own manufacture with its later camera designs. Zenza Bronica Ltd. was eventually acquired by the lens manufacturer Tamron. Zenzaburo Yoshino died in 1988.

Tamron discontinued the brand's single-lens reflex models (SQ, ETR and GS) in October 2004, sales having suffered from the lack of a digital back and loss of market share to DSLRs, particularly for the wedding photography business which had previously been a heavy user of medium format but switched quickly to digital for its workflow benefits. Bronica's last model, the RF645 rangefinder camera, was discontinued in October 2005.