Glass Bodies a variant-level encyclopedia of vintage lenses and cameras by iwillpat

Bronica RF645

Zenza Bronica · Bronica RF mount · 41.5 × 56 mm, upright when the camera is held normally; 120 or 220 film, set by a selector on the back · 2000

single source, unconfirmed

Also known as: Bronica RF645 · Bronica RF 645 · Zenza Bronica RF645 · Bronica RF-645 · RF645 · Bronica 645 RF · Bronica RF645 65mm · Bronica RF645 kit · ゼンザブロニカ RF645 · ブロニカ RF645 · ブロニカRF645 · Tamron Bronica RF645

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
RF645, serial prefix 0 (65 and 135 mm frames) Bronica RF 2000 0000570 (camera-wiki example) —
RF645, serial prefix 1 (65 and 100 mm frames) Bronica RF 2001–2005 1002124 (camera-wiki example) —
  1. Dates: English Wikipedia gives a May 2000 announcement; Japanese Wikipedia and camera-wiki put sales from November 2000. Tamron's notice of 20 October 2005 ended production at the end of that month and with it Bronica camera manufacture; Japanese Wikipedia dates the end of sales to the same day. camera-wiki says Tamron supported the camera until 2012.
  2. Finder and meter figures are the owner's manual's (Tamron export edition, printed when the 135 was still the telephoto): 53.5 mm base, 33 mm effective, 0.6×, 81% at 3 m, EV 3–18, ISO 25–1600, ±2 EV in half stops. camera-wiki repeats the base and magnification and describes the meter as centre-weighted average, adjusting to the mounted focal length; the manual's own words are 'center-weighted area-comparative'.
  3. Construction: camera-wiki describes an aluminium die-cast skeleton, a pressed lower cover and a thixomolded magnesium-alloy top cover; Japanese Wikipedia says the magnesium body is injection-moulded by the Thixomolding process; the manual names the top cover as the thixomolded part.
  4. Prices: the ¥220,000 figure is the set price on Tamron Japan's archived product page, tax-inclusive ¥231,000 after the 2004 tax change; the $2,132 kit price is Tamron USA's 2004 list. Mike Johnston quoted a suggested street price of $1,800 for body and 65 mm in June 2001 and, in January 2009, a $450 rebate that brought the kit to about $1,150; these are dealer prices, not list.
  5. Awards (camera-wiki): Camera Grand Prix 2001 Special Prize from the Camera Press Club of Japan; EISA European Professional Camera 2001–2002; TIPA Best Professional Photo Product 2001–2002.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • A 6×4.5 rangefinder that frames upright with the camera held normally: the finder window is taller than it is wide, and the film runs left to right (Greenspun; Johnston)
  • 'BRONICA' on the front plate and 'RF645' on the top cover; black finish only. Bayonet mount with a row of electrical contacts and a light-shield curtain visible behind the mount when no lens is fitted
  • Shutter-speed dial with B, 1–500, A and P on the top plate; AE-L button under the wind lever; ME (multiple exposure), 120/220 and exposure-compensation controls on the back panel; a mechanical cable-release socket in the shutter button
  • Serial prefix 0 and 65/135 frames in the finder: early. Prefix 1 and 65/100 frames: later (camera-wiki)
  • No lens, no shutter: the shutter and its cocking motor live in each Zenzanon-RF lens, so a body alone cannot be fired. Two CR2 cells; nothing works without them

RF645, serial prefix 0 (65 and 135 mm frames):

  • Serial number beginning 0; the finder switches between 65 mm and 135 mm bright frames (camera-wiki, serial 0000570)
  • The owner's manual printed for these bodies lists the 135 mm f/4.5 as the system's telephoto and the finder frames as 65 and 135 mm

RF645, serial prefix 1 (65 and 100 mm frames):

  • Serial number beginning 1; the finder switches between 65 mm and 100 mm bright frames (camera-wiki, serial 1002124)

Serial-range notes

0xxxxxx
Early bodies, built with 65 and 135 mm finder frames (camera-wiki, example 0000570).
1xxxxxx
Later bodies, built with 65 and 100 mm finder frames (camera-wiki, example 1002124). No production total or serial-to-year table has been published.

Specifications

Format
41.5 × 56 mm, upright when the camera is held normally; 120 or 220 film, set by a selector on the back · 16 on 120, 32 on 220 exposures
Finder
inverse Galilean viewfinder with coupled dual-image superimposing rangefinder, bright frames switched automatically by the mounted lens, automatic parallax compensation, LCD data panel · 0.6× magnification · 65mm, 100mm, 135mm framelines · automatic, one frame at a time, selected by the mounted lens; the 45 mm shows no frame and uses the RF45VF shoe finder · automatic parallax correction · 81% coverage
Base length
53.5 mm
Effective baselength
33 mm
Shutter
none in body; Bronica #00 electronically controlled leaf shutter in each lens, cocked by a motor in the lens; electromagnetic release; a light-shield curtain covers the film automatically when a lens is removed · B, 1s–1/500 in manual (whole stops); 8s–1/500 in aperture-priority AE and 8s–1/750 in program AE, both in 1/12-stop steps · flash sync X at all speeds; hot shoe with contacts for the Speedlight RF20 and a sync terminal · self-timer
Film advance
single-stroke lever, 186° throw with 12° stand-off, ratcheted strokes allowed; multiple exposure by the ME button on the back
Back
hinged, fixed; 120/220 selector on the back; film memo holder
Meter
centre-weighted, not through the lens, read from the camera front and matched to the mounted lens; EV 3–18 at ISO 100 with the 65 mm f/4; ISO 25–1600; exposure compensation ±2 EV in half stops; AE lock held for five minutes; program, aperture-priority and manual; two CR2 lithium cells
Motor drive
Not compatible
Weight
810 g
Dimensions
145.6 × 107.3 × 64 body only; 810 g without batteries (owner's manual; Tamron Japan) mm
Country
Japan
Original price
¥220,000 (¥231,000 with tax) for the standard set of body and Zenzanon-RF 65mm f/4 (Tamron Japan product page; the body alone is not priced there); US$2,132 for the same kit on Tamron USA's 2004 list (today $3,540)
Accessories
Bronica Speedlight RF20, dedicated flash cross-coupled with the body through the hot-shoe contacts; guide number 20 (ISO 100, m), 16 at the 45 mm coverage (Greenspun; camera-wiki) · RF45VF external finder for the Zenzanon-RF 45mm f/4, supplied with that lens (Japanese Wikipedia) · Double accessory-shoe adapter so the RF45VF and the RF20 can be mounted together · Interchangeable eyepiece dioptre lenses; RF(-1) supplied with the body · Camera strap RF(N), rubber eyecup RF, body cap RF, hot-shoe and sync-terminal covers (owner's manual packing list)

Owner's manual figures: 0.6× magnification, 53.5 mm base line, 33 mm effective base line, viewing field 81% at 3 m, bright frames for the 65 mm and 135 mm lenses. camera-wiki gives the same base and magnification and records that later bodies carry 65 and 100 mm frames. The LCD inside the finder shows shutter speed, aperture, exposure mode, AE lock, exposure-compensation and multiple-exposure warnings, flash ready and a low-battery symbol. The eyepiece lens is interchangeable for dioptre correction: an RF(-1) is supplied. The 45 mm is composed through its shoe-mounted finder; the body finder still focuses it.

Figures we worked out rather than found: The 2001 start of the serial-prefix-1 bodies is inferred from the 100 mm lens's introduction, not read from a dated source.

Where sources disagree

Announced
  • May 2000 — English Wikipedia
  • November 2000 release — Japanese Wikipedia; camera-wiki citing Shashin Kōgyō vol. 58 no. 10 (2000)

Better supported: Both: announcement in May, sale from November

Not a conflict so much as two events; no Tamron release of May 2000 was reached.

Meter
  • centre-weighted area-comparative, EV 3–18 — owner's manual
  • centre-weighted average, non-TTL, adjusted to the mounted focal length — camera-wiki

Better supported: owner's manual

Two descriptions of one meter; the manual's sensitivity diagrams show a central hump that narrows with the 135.

What reviewers say

History

The RF645 was the one camera Bronica designed from a clean sheet after Tamron absorbed the company in 1998, and the last camera to carry the name. It was announced in May 2000 and reached shops in November, a 6×4.5 coupled rangefinder built around Bronica’s #00 electronically timed leaf shutter, one in each Zenzanon-RF lens and cocked by a small motor in the lens, so that the body holds no shutter at all; a light-shield curtain drops across the film gate by itself when a lens comes off and opens again when the next one is locked on. The frame is 41.5 × 56 mm and stands upright when the camera is held normally, the film running left to right, which gives sixteen portrait frames on 120 and thirty-two on 220 and obliges the photographer to turn the camera on its side for a horizontal picture. The top cover is magnesium alloy formed by the Thixomolding process over a die-cast aluminium skeleton; the body alone weighs 810 g and measures 145.6 × 107.3 × 64 mm. Two CR2 cells run everything, and nothing works without them.

The finder is an inverse Galilean of 0.6× with a 53.5 mm rangefinder base, 33 mm effective, and a bright frame switched by the mounted lens: 65 mm or 135 mm on the bodies as first built, 65 mm or 100 mm on later ones, with automatic parallax correction and a viewing field of 81% at 3 m. The 45 mm shows no frame in it and is composed through the RF45VF shoe finder. An LCD inside the finder carries shutter speed, aperture, mode, AE lock, compensation and battery warnings, which Mike Johnston called the best readout on any rangefinder he knew. The meter reads from the camera front, not through the lens, centre-weighted and adjusted to the mounted lens, EV 3 to 18 at ISO 100 with the 65 mm; it drives program AE to 1/750, aperture-priority AE from 8 s to 1/500 in twelfth-stop steps, and manual exposure in whole stops from 1 s to 1/500 plus B, with ±2 EV of compensation in half stops and an AE lock that holds its reading for five minutes. Flash syncs at every speed, and the dedicated Speedlight RF20 reads aperture and ISO from the body through the hot-shoe contacts. In Japan the body sold only as a set with the 65 mm f/4 at ¥220,000; Tamron USA’s 2004 list put the same kit at $2,132.

The system’s trouble was its lenses. Three were announced, the 45 mm f/4, the 65 mm f/4 and a 135 mm f/4.5, and the first manual lists all three; but the 135 could not be focused reliably on a 33 mm effective base without matching each body to its lens, and it was withdrawn almost at once, Japanese Wikipedia calling the cancellation abrupt. A 100 mm f/4.5 took its place in 2001, Tamron USA never imported the 135 (Greenspun, 2001), and bodies built afterwards carry serial numbers beginning 1 and a 100 mm frame in place of the 135. Every lens opened at f/4 or f/4.5, which Johnston in 2001 and again in 2009 named as the limitation that kept the camera from selling: it was, in his words of 2009, a commercial disappointment mainly because of its lens line-up, even after a $450 rebate brought the kit to about $1,150. The 100 was run out in Japan in September 2004, and on 20 October 2005 Tamron announced that RF645 production would stop at the end of that month, closing a camera business that had begun with the Bronica Z of 1959. Tamron kept servicing the camera until 2012.

The reviewers who used it liked it more than the market did. Greenspun found the rangefinder patch as large and bright as a Leica M6’s, the controls workable in gloves, the camera unobtrusive and easy, and the meter about two stops under in dim interiors; Johnston found it well balanced, quiet and well integrated, and recommended it warmly as a second camera or a black-and-white walk-around; Camera Legend in 2022 called it the most fun 645 camera its author had used, while warning that the wind mechanism breaks when forced, that rangefinder windows drift out of alignment, and that parts are scarce now that Tamron has stopped repairing them. It won the Camera Grand Prix 2001 Special Prize and the EISA and TIPA professional awards of 2001–02. A buyer should check that the lever winds smoothly and the rangefinder agrees with the lens at infinity and at a metre, remember that the body cannot be fired without a lens, and look at the first digit of the serial number: a 0 means a body built for the 135, a 1 one built for the 100.

Left open: a production total, a serial-to-year table, a Tamron document for the exchange of 135s for 100s and the refitting of early finder masks, and a list price for the body alone in any currency.

Expand Collapse

This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Live listings

Buying from Yahoo! Auctions outside Japan. It is a domestic marketplace: sellers ship within Japan, and most will not register an overseas buyer. A proxy service bids on your behalf, receives the item and forwards it, for a fee and a wait. Buyee, Jauce and ZenMarket each accept a Yahoo auction number directly. Listed alphabetically for information — none is recommended over another, and none of these is an affiliate link.

Listings updated 2026-11-02. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Bronica ETRSi

Lenses for this body: Zenzanon-RF 45mm f/4 · Zenzanon-RF 65mm f/4 · Zenzanon-RF 100mm f/4.5 · Zenzanon-RF 135mm f/4.5

Sources (12)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this camera, know a serial number I'm missing, or can see where I have it wrong, tell me — corrections, serials and sample photos are all worth having.