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

Contax TVS

Kyocera · Fixed lens · 24×36mm on 35mm film, with a switchable panoramic mask on the first model · 1993

via machine translation — corrections welcome

Also known as: CONTAX TVS · Contax T-VS · Contax TVS II · Contax TVSII · コンタックスTVS

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
TVS 35mm compact 1993 — No figure published
TVS II 35mm compact 1997 — No figure published
  1. No production figure has ever been published for the TVS or the TVS II, in any finish. Kyocera published nothing before it left the camera business in 2005, and no serial study of the kind that exists for the Yashica Electro 35 has been attempted on these.
  2. The autofocus is passive — Sunrise Camera calls it 外光式パッシブ, an external passive system, and English Wikipedia calls the TVS passive phase detection. James Tocchio describes an infrared focus assist lamp for low light, which is consistent: the lamp throws a pattern for the passive sensor to read rather than measuring the distance itself. This is the point on which the TVS differs from the T2, whose autofocus is active infrared.
  3. Dealers describe data-back examples of both models as the TVS D and TVS II D. As with the T3, that D is trade shorthand for a back, not a Kyocera model designation.
  4. The end of production is not published for either model. Kyocera announced on 12 April 2005 that it was terminating the Contax business and had stopped production at the end of March; the TVS II was in any case superseded by the TVS III in 1999, and nothing states when the earlier cameras left the price list.
  5. Every specification in the family block above — the 16 s to 1/700 programmed shutter and its 16 s to 1/500 aperture-priority limit, the ±5 EV compensation, the 375 g and the 123 × 67 × 41.5 mm — is a figure published for the first TVS. No source consulted publishes a specification sheet for the TVS II, and the changes it is described as making are all to the controls and the finder rather than to the shutter or the lens. The TVS II's numbers here are therefore the TVS's, carried forward, and not independently confirmed.
  6. Kamerastore's specification for the TVS reads "28-56mm f3.5-5.6", which no other source supports — every other listing, and the engraving on the lens itself, gives f/3.5–6.5. A useful reminder that the widely copied English spec blocks for this family are not independent of one another.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Titanium body, and the only 35mm Contax compact whose lens starts at 28mm — the qualifier matters, because the APS Contax Tix of 1997 carries a fixed Sonnar T* 28mm f/2.8 and is routinely counted against this claim
  • The zoom is turned by hand — no motor, and near-silent, which is the mechanical fact that separates the TVS and TVS II from every other zoom compact of the period and from the TVS III that replaced them
  • Vario-Sonnar T* 28–56mm f/3.5–6.5, with a 30.5mm filter thread
  • About 375 g and roughly 123 × 67 × 42 mm — noticeably larger and heavier than a T2

TVS:

  • A tabbed zoom lever on the lens barrel rather than a knurled ring
  • A panorama switch, and the masked frame it produces
  • A separate clip-on lens cap: there is no built-in barrier
  • An aperture ring at the base of the barrel, clicked in whole stops, with a P detent

TVS II:

  • A zoom ring encircling the front of the lens in place of the first model's lever
  • A built-in barrier over the lens — no separate cap to lose
  • No panorama switch: the function was deleted
  • A brighter real-image finder reading out exact shutter speeds rather than approximations

Specifications

Format
24×36mm on 35mm film, with a switchable panoramic mask on the first model
Finder
Real-image zoom finder coupled to the lens; brightened and simplified on the TVS II · no rangefinder image
Shutter
electronically controlled leaf shutter in the lens · 16 s – 1/700 on program; 16 s – 1/500 on aperture priority · self-timer
Film advance
motorised: automatic loading, advance and rewind
Back
hinged; data-back versions were catalogued for both models
Meter
Silicon photodiode cell, program and aperture-priority automatic, exposure compensation ±5 EV. DX coding reads ISO 25 – 5000. One 3 V lithium cell, CR123A or DL123A (one-scene.com).
Weight
375 g
Dimensions
123 × 67 × 41.5 (one-scene.com); 124 × 67 × 42 with 397 g including battery (Kamerastore) mm
Country
Japan
Original price
170,000 yen for the TVS at launch and 150,000 yen for the TVS II, per Ishii Camera. Casual Photophile records the used price in 2019 as about $250 for a TVS against $500 for a TVS II. (today ¥193,000)

Where sources disagree

Introduction of the first TVS
  • 1993, at 170,000 yen (Ishii Camera; awane-photo's Camera Museum; Sunrise Camera gives the year without the price). September 1993 appears in Japanese search summaries of dealer specification listings; no page giving the month was read in full for this entry, so the month is carried as weaker than the year
  • 1994 (Casual Photophile; Kamerastore; most English-language writing)

Better supported: 1993 in Japan

The two are probably describing different events — a Japanese launch late in 1993 and Western availability in 1994 — but no source says so, and the yen price attached to the 1993 date is the kind of detail that comes from a price list rather than from memory. The entry carries 1993 for that reason and flags 1994 because half the literature uses it.

Vario-Sonnar 28–56mm, lens construction
  • 6 elements in 6 groups — 6群6枚 (Sunrise Camera, and Japanese spec listings)
  • 7 elements in 6 groups (Kamerastore; repeated across English enthusiast writing)

Better supported: Unresolved

Neither figure has been traced to a Kyocera datasheet or a Zeiss cross-section. The Japanese and English literatures each agree internally and disagree with each other, which is the signature of two chains of copying rather than two measurements. Until a published diagram turns up, the element count for this lens should be treated as unknown.

Weight
  • 375 g (one-scene.com, and Japanese listings)
  • 397 g with battery (Kamerastore)

Better supported: Unresolved

The obvious reading is body-only against body-with-cell, and Kamerastore is the only one of the two that says which it means. It does not quite close: the camera runs on a single 3 V CR123A, which weighs about 17 g, and the gap between the two published weights is 22 g. Five grams is small enough to be a rounding or a strap, and large enough that neither figure can be derived from the other. Recorded because a buyer comparing spec blocks will meet both numbers with no explanation attached to either.

What reviewers say

History

The TVS is what the initials say it is: Titanium Vario-Sonnar. Kyocera took the body language of the T2, made it a little larger, and put a Carl Zeiss 28–56mm f/3.5–6.5 zoom on the front — the only Contax compact that begins at 28mm. The Japanese launch was in 1993 at 170,000 yen, one specification listing giving the month as September; English-language writing dates the camera to 1994, which is very probably when it reached shops outside Japan, though no source consulted actually says that.

The mechanical fact worth knowing is that the zoom is turned by hand. A tabbed lever on the first model, a ring around the lens on the TVS II, and in both cases no motor: the lens moves when the photographer moves it and makes no noise doing so. Under it sits a clicked aperture ring with a P detent, which is how aperture priority is engaged. That combination — manual zoom, manual aperture, titanium shell — is what the family is bought for now, and it is why the TVS III, which replaced both controls with buttons, is treated as a separate camera on this site.

The TVS II of 1997 is a housekeeping revision. It brightens the finder and makes it report exact shutter speeds, it swaps the zoom lever for a ring, it builds the barrier into the lens so the separate cap can no longer be lost, and it deletes the panorama switch that the first model had. It also cost 20,000 yen less than the camera it replaced. Both models were offered in black and in champagne-silver titanium, and both were catalogued with a data back, which dealers write as TVS D and TVS II D — the same shorthand that has convinced a good part of the internet that a Contax T3D is a separate model.

Two things this page cannot settle. The first is the lens: Japanese specification listings give the Vario-Sonnar as six elements in six groups, English-language ones as seven elements in six groups, and neither figure traces back to a Kyocera datasheet or a published Zeiss cross-section. The two literatures are internally consistent and mutually contradictory, which usually means two chains of copying rather than two counts. The second is the size of the production run, and here the answer is simpler: there is no figure, for either model, in any finish. Kyocera published none, closed the camera business on 12 April 2005, and left the question where it stands.

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.

Example photos

Sample photo taken with the Contax TVS
Contax T-VS — classic-photographic, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)
Sample photo taken with the Contax TVS
Altes Rathaus, Wiesbaden — shot on a Contax TVS — Original uploader was User:Mju1975 at hu.wikipedia, via Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Contax TVS? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $590 across 32 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $530–$610). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 3 days: unchanged from $590.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$590$530–$61032
2026-09-10$590$540–$61031
2026-09-06$590$530–$61033

Asking prices from the listings scanned, not sales; junk-flagged rows and auction lots excluded; other currencies are not converted.

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Listings updated 2026-09-11. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Contax T3 · Contax TVS III · Fujifilm Natura Classica

Sources (11)

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.