rectaflex was the name of an italian camera maker from 1947 to 1958. it was also the name of their sole model. the rectaflex was a 35mm slr camera with a focal plane shutter, interchangeable lenses and a pentaprism eye-level finder. rectaflex (followed by contax s) was the first slr camera introducing the modern pentaprism eye-level finder. the first prototype (rectaflex 947) was presented in 1947 with a final presentation in april 1948, and start of series production (a 1000) in september the same year, thus hitting the market one year before the contax s, presented in 1949. both were preceded by alpa-reflex, first presented to a wider public in april 1944 at the swiss trade fair in basel (schweizer mustermesse). alpa’s production was slow up to 1945, and it lacked a pentaprism-image was reversed.