R Topcor 300mm (30cm) f/2.8

Topcon · Exakta · 1957

Also known as: R Topcor 1:2.8 f=30cm · R Topcor 1:2.8 f=300mm · R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 · R Topcor 300mm f2.8 · R Topcor 300mm F2.8 · R Topcor 30cm f/2.8 · R Topcor 30cm f2.8 · R. Topcor 300mm f2.8 · R.Topcor 300mm f2.8 · R.Topcor 300mm f/2.8 · R.Topcor 30cm f2.8 · R.Topcor 30cm f/2.8 · R-Topcor 300mm f2.8 · R Topcor 2.8/300 · R.Topcor 1:2.8 f=30cm · Topcor 300mm f2.8 · Topcor 300mm f/2.8 · Topcor 30cm f2.8 · Topcon 300mm f2.8 · Topcon 300mm f/2.8 · Topcon R Topcor 300mm f2.8 · Tokyo Kogaku R Topcor 300mm f2.8 · Tokyo Kogaku R. Topcor 300mm F/2.8 · Rトプコール 300mm F2.8 · R トプコール 300mm F2.8 · Rトプコール 30cm F2.8 · トプコール 300mm F2.8 · トプコン 300mm F2.8 · トプコン Rトプコール 300mm F2.8

Variants & identification

Variant	Mount	Years	Serial ranges	Production
R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 (preset, Exakta-type bayonet)	Exakta	1957	—	—

Engraving. The Maxifiche says the R Topcor series gave the focal length in centimetres until about 1970, which would make an early copy read 30cm and a late one 300mm. No source shows the name ring of this lens, so neither engraving is confirmed and the lens is carried as one variant. A seller's title that says 30cm or 300mm is not evidence of what the ring reads.
Optical construction. Topcon Club gives 6 elements in 4 groups, and Flashback Camera's listing repeats it. Paillard's US catalogue, the Maxifiche's R Topcor table and the RE300/RE200 instruction book's lens table all give 5 elements. Five elements is set: it is the maker's own figure (Tokyo Kogaku's instruction book) and is shared by the two catalogues. Paillard says the UV filter in the slot is an optical component, and on the RE Auto-Topcor 500mm Topcon Club explicitly counts its slot UV filter as one of six elements; it may be doing the same here, which would reconcile 6 with 5, but its 300mm text does not say so. For the same reason the group count is left blank: Topcon Club's 4 groups is the only figure and may include the filter.
Closest focus 4.5 m and the f/2.8–22 aperture range are from the Maxifiche; Paillard gives 15 ft. Diameter, length and weight are from Topcon Club; Paillard also gives 3,300 g (7½ lb), and the Maxifiche 'more than 3 kg'.
Dates. Topcon Club's page on the Topcon R (announced December 1957) lists the 300mm f/2.8 among the preset R Topcors that came with the camera, and its lens page dates the lens to 1957. Topcon Club says it was in catalogues into the late 1970s; the Maxifiche says it was still in the Super DM catalogue in 1976. No end date is known.
'First 300mm f/2.8.' Topcon Club calls it the world's first 300mm f/2.8 and says the next one sold to the general public was Nikon's, in 1977; Paillard's catalogue calls it 'the only 300mm f/2.8 lens that permits reflex viewing and focusing'. These are the claims of a collectors' club and a distributor, not an independent survey.
Tokyo Olympics. Topcon Club says the lens served as an official record lens of the Tokyo Olympics (1964) because of its speed, and Flashback Camera repeats it. No Olympic or Topcon document is cited for it.
R (1957): the Maxifiche says the R's bayonet has no coupling of any kind ('sans aucun couplage') and lists no meter for the body. The lens is a manual preset lens and needs neither, so it works fully, metered by hand.
RII (Automatic R), RIII and RS: these bodies add a stop-down lever for the F Auto-Topcors (Maxifiche), which this lens does not use. The RIII's clip-on selenium meter and the RS's clip-on CdS meter are coupled to the shutter speeds, not the lens (Maxifiche), so they can be used with the aperture set by hand.
RE Super, Super D, Super DM and RE-2: Paillard's catalogue, which sold the lens with the Super DM, gives 'stop-down exposure measurement' for it, so the TTL meter of these bodies reads with the lens stopped down by hand, not at full aperture.
⁰ RE200 and RE300: these keep the RE mount of the RE Super (Topcon Club). Their own instruction book lists the R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 in its table of Topcor lenses, with a preset diaphragm and stop-down metering (5 elements, 8°, f/2.8–22, 4.5 m, 3,300 g).
¹ Ihagee Exakta bodies: the Maxifiche calls the Topcon R's mount a fully compatible Exakta bayonet and says Exakta lenses with plain or manual preset diaphragms mount on Topcons without difficulty. Topcon Club notes that Topcon put its release on the opposite side to Exakta, so lenses with a protruding preset arm lose that function when swapped. This lens has no arm, but no source describes it on an Ihagee Exakta.
² Nikon conversions. Topcon Club says many surviving copies have been converted to Nikon mount and that copies in the original mount are the scarcer ones. A converted lens is the same optics with a replaced mount; it is not a factory version and does not fit Topcon bodies.

How to tell them apart (expand)

R Topcor, f/2.8, 3.3 kg: the only fast 300mm in the Topcon range. The R Topcor 300mm f/5.6 of the same years weighs about 740 g and takes a 62 mm screw-in filter; the RE Auto-Topcor 300mm f/5.6 has an automatic diaphragm
Exakta-type bayonet on an original copy; many survivors carry a Nikon F mount fitted later (Topcon Club). Not the UV mount of the leaf-shutter Topcons, and not a Topcor for Leica screw mount

R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 (preset, Exakta-type bayonet):

A very large barrel for a 300mm: 130 mm across, 412 mm long and 3.3 kg (Topcon Club); a two-stage telescoping hood pulls out over the front element
Manual preset diaphragm, no automatic-diaphragm arm or pin at the mount; aperture scale f/2.8 to f/22 (Maxifiche)
A filter slot in the barrel near the mount, with the filter dropped in from above; Paillard says the UV filter supplied in it is an optical component of the lens (Paillard, Topcon Club)
A tripod socket on the lens (Paillard; visible on Flashback Camera's copy); only the mount section turns for vertical framing, so the camera rotates while the lens stays put (Topcon Club)

R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 (preset, Exakta-type bayonet): One version is documented. Topcon Club and Flashback Camera describe it as an Exakta-type mount lens with the slot filter; Paillard listed it in the 1970s as the R Topcor 300mm f/2.8, and a 1976 Super DM catalogue still carried it (Maxifiche). The Maxifiche says the R Topcors were engraved in centimetres until about 1970, but no source shows the engraving on this lens, so no split by engraving is made (see note ¹). Topcon Club says the early lenses came in a leather case and the later ones in a hard case with a plastic TOPCON emblem; Paillard's 1970s US catalogue still lists it with a leather case.

Specifications

Construction: 5 elements
Aperture range: f/2.8–f/22
Min. focus: 4.5 m
Dimensions: 130 × 412 mm
Weight: 3300 g
Filter: Drop-in slot near the mount; UV filter supplied in it
Years manufactured: 1957
Country: Japan
Original price: ¥135,000 Japanese list price at launch in 1957, described by Topcon Club as the most expensive lens (its English text says 'on the market'). Paillard Incorporated's undated 1970s US catalogue, which lists the Super DM as the Topcon Supreme, lists it at US$904.40 with UV filter, built-in hood and leather case, catalogue no. 80640 (a US list price, not the launch price). (today ¥844,000)

What reviewers say

No reviews aggregated yet — this family is still in the research queue. Written one? We'd love to index it.

History

The R Topcor 300mm f/2.8 is the fast long lens Tokyo Kogaku offered with its first focal-plane SLR, the Topcon R of 1957. Topcon Club, the Japanese collectors’ site, lists it among the preset R Topcors that came with the camera, and it was an extraordinary thing to offer in 1957: a 300mm f/2.8 that could be focused through the reflex finder, 130 mm across, 412 mm long and 3.3 kg. Topcon Club calls it the world’s first サンニッパ (300mm f/2.8) and says the next one on general sale was Nikon’s, two decades later. It cost ¥135,000 at launch, and Topcon Club calls it the most expensive lens of its day. It was also long-lived: Paillard, Topcon’s US distributor in the 1970s, still listed it at US$904.40 beside the Super DM, and the French Maxifiche finds it in the 1976 Super DM catalogue. Topcon Club says it was the official record lens of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics because of its speed, and Flashback Camera repeats the claim; neither cites an Olympic or Topcon document.

It is a manual preset lens. The taking aperture is set on the preset ring, the lens is focused at full aperture and stopped down by hand before the exposure. Nothing in the mount couples to the body, so it can be used on every Topcon focal-plane body: metered by hand on the R, with the clip-on meters on the RIII and RS, and stopped down through the TTL meter on the RE Super, Super D, Super DM and RE-2 (Paillard gives it as a stop-down metering lens). The RE200 and RE300, which keep the RE mount, list it in their instruction book with stop-down metering. The Maxifiche says Exakta preset lenses mount on Topcons without trouble, though Topcon Club warns that lenses with an external preset arm do not work across the two makes because Topcon put its release on the other side. This lens has no arm, but no source describes it on an Ihagee Exakta. It does not fit the leaf-shutter Topcons (PR, Wink Mirror, Uni, Unirex, IC-1), whose UV-mount lenses are a separate system.

The barrel has three features worth knowing. Filters drop into a slot near the mount, and Topcon Club thinks this lens was the first to do it. The UV filter supplied in the slot is part of the optical design, and Paillard warned that the lens must not be used with the slot empty. The hood is a two-stage telescope that pulls out over the front element. And for vertical pictures only the mount section turns, so the camera rotates behind a lens that stays put on its tripod mount. Topcon Club contrasts this with the later RE Auto-Topcor 500mm, where the automatic diaphragm forces lens and body to turn together. The sources disagree on the optics: Topcon Club gives 6 elements in 4 groups, Paillard and the Maxifiche 5 elements. Topcon Club rates it sharp and contrasty enough to stand beside modern fluorite lenses.

For a buyer, the first question is the mount. Topcon Club says many surviving copies have been converted to Nikon F, and that copies in the original Exakta-type mount are the scarcer ones. A converted lens will not go back on a Topcon without the original mount. Ask whether the slot filter is present: a lens sold without its UV filter, as Flashback Camera’s copy was (it came with a yellow filter instead), needs a filter in the slot to perform as designed. Check that the hood’s two stages slide and hold, and that the mount section turns and locks. Check that the preset ring closes the blades to the set value. Topcon Club says early copies came in a leather case and later ones in a hard case with a plastic TOPCON emblem, though Paillard’s 1970s US catalogue still lists a leather case, so the case is only a rough guide to age. The Maxifiche says the R Topcors were engraved in centimetres until about 1970, but no source shows which engravings this lens carries.

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

More sample photos elsewhere

These photographers keep all rights to their work — enjoy it at the source.

Sample photo wanted — shot with a R Topcor 300mm (30cm) f/2.8? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $1,700 across 3 fixed-price listings on 2026-11-10 (middle half $1,400–$1,700). First day tracked.

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

Vintage Topcon R. Topcor 300mm f/2.8 Telephoto Lens - Tokyo Kogaku Japan w/ Case — $1,400.00 · eBay · likely preset
Ex Topcor Tokyo kogaku Japan R.Topcor 300mm f/2.8 30cm Lens w/Lens Bracket — $1,680.00 · eBay · likely preset
Topcon R. Topcor 300mm f/2.8 GOOD+ — $1,795.00 · eBay · likely preset
Vintage Tokyo Kogaku R. Topcor 300mm 1:2.8 telephoto lens - for parts — $500.00 · eBay junk / for parts

Listings updated 2026-11-10. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.