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The name Shibayama applies to various Japanese companies.

Wartime camera maker[]

Shibayama Seisakusho (柴山製作所) was a Japanese company which made the Semi Rody 4.5×6 folders between 1940 and 1942. These cameras were distributed by Yamashita Yūjirō Shōten. The Shibayama company was based in Tokyo, Asakusa.[1]

The company was perhaps tied to Miyoshi and Proud, whose cameras were distributed by Yamashita too. Some models of the Semi Rody were equipped with U.L.L. lenses made by Miyoshi, and the range of models made by Shibayama was very similar to the range of Proud cameras: the first model of the Semi Rody is a Baldax copy like the first Semi Proud cameras, while the Semi Rody II is inspired from the Duo Six-20 like the Semi Prux.

A company currently exists (2007) under the name K.K. Shibayama Kagaku Kikai Seisakusho (㈱柴山科学器械製作所, translated as Shibayama Scientific Co., Ltd.). It was founded in 1909 by Shibayama Etsujirō (柴山悦次郎) as Shibayama Seisakusho (柴山製作所), became a Yūgen-gaisha in 1941 and took the name Shibayama Kagaku Kikai Seisakusho in 1961.[2] This company is not directly related to the maker of the Semi Rody, but the camera maker might have been founded by a member of the same family.[3]

Postwar shutter maker[]

After the war, the MSK shutters were made by a company called Shibayama Seisakusho or Shibayama Kōki Seisakusho (芝山製作所 or 芝山光機製作所).[4] The name "Shibayama" is written with different characters and this company is certainly not related to the other ones. This company was based in the northern part of Tokyo, around Adachi-ku or Arakawa-ku.[4]

Notes[]

  1. Its address in 1942 was Tōkyō-shi Asakusa-ku Kita-Matsuyama-chō 17 (東京市浅草区北松山町十七). Source: advertisement dated January 1942 reproduced in Kokusan kamera no rekishi, p.107.
  2. Shibayama official website.
  3. Private communication to User:Rebollo_fr by Shibayama Yukio (柴山幸雄), CEO of Shibayama Kagaku Kikai Seisakusho. Shibayama Yukio remembers that his father Shibayama Mitsuyoshi (柴山光義) told him years ago about the camera maker based in Asakusa but does not know if it was ruled by a relative of the family.
  4. 4.0 4.1 Testimony of Umemoto Hideo, reported in a private communication to User:Rebollo_fr by Umemoto Akio, son of Hideo and grandson of Umemoto Kinzaburō, the founder of the Umemoto company.

Bibliography[]

Links[]

In Japanese:

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