Mamiya ZE

The Mamiya ZE was Mamiya’s attempt to cash in on the amateur photography boom in the 1970s. Introduced in 1980, it featured real modern advances- mostly in communication between the lens and the camera, most of which were unrealized before Mamiya decided to stick to their mainstay: medium format.

The Mamiya ZE was my first SLR, gifted to me, second hand, in 1997 along with the 38-70mm lens. Looking back, it’s many ways a terrible design- I understand why Mamiya abandoned the 35mm market and the ZE: but nevertheless it’s approach has really defined how I do photography.

The ZE has one mode: aperture priority. To this day it remains my favorite mode - it’s where I’m always most comfortable. It’s what I shoot with when I’m on my own, without worrying about anything else. It allows me to keep the focus on what I consider to be the creative choices in photography: aperture defines more of the image than does shutter or ISO. But I wonder now and again wether that’s true, or, if I’m just headed back towards the mode I’m most familiar.

The 38-70mm may just be one of the worst lenses ever made. It’s designed backwards- so 38mm is when the lens is pushed out furthest from the camera. It’s a push-pull design, which means it’s pretty easy to get something like say, sand from a beach in the lens mechanism, making it a little tough to push/pull. And, it doesn’t focus to infinity at one end of the zoom- that’s it’s “macro” mode. But, it seems strongest around 50mm, and that’s where I usually ended up shooting, and, that remains my favorite focal length today.

So, while I don’t know that I’d ever recommend using this camera, I’ve got some really fond memories of it, and I wouldn’t consider parting with it: it’s defined how I approach photography.

About the shoot

For me, the Mamiya ZE seems very much a camera aimed at the amateur. For me, amateur photography has always been about travel photography- about recording your experiences in the world, so, I wanted to communicate that in the setup for this shoot.

So I grabbed a stack of photos that have yet to make it into an album and setup a few umbrellas with hot shoe flashes and I snapped away.