James's Camera Collection: Counterfeit "Canon" Q5200

Counterfeit "Canon" Q5200 Japan 35mm cameras
Counterfeit "Canon" Q5200
Camera type: 35mm viewfinder
Lens Mount: fixed
Approx. street value: $1

Also sold as the Olympia, Professional, Opticapture and Polo this or that—the model numbers for all of them are a bowl of alphanumeric soup.

As far as I know, Canon is the only company whose logo was purloined for this. Regardless, it's a counterfeit. It's not listed anywhere in Canon's reference material (they're very good at documenting it online). It has none of Canon's normal way of identifying its cameras. It bears zero resemblance to anything else Canon made before or since. And it's identical to any of a number of other oddball brands mentioned above.

This isn't even an SLR. Look at the pentaprism and you can see the viewing lens; there's a mirror behind it and the waist-level finder is on the top of the prism housing. There's also an eye-level finder on the camera's left-hand side, just underneith the flash coupler. The taking lens a fixed focus, fixed aperture, permanently mounted. The thing looks impressive until you actually pick it up and give it a serious look...

 

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