Summary

Black and white, silver gelatin photograph of a man operating a light engineers' lathe in the Camera Repair Workshop located in the Camera Assembly building Duke Street at the Kodak factory, Abbotsford, Victoria, circa 1957.

A range of cameras were repaired in this workshop ranging from Box Brownies to professional units. Consumer type cameras were generally repaired by replacing worn or broken assemblies with parts which had been stamped out or pressed to shape on a mass production line from the supplier, in most cases from within Kodak itself. Repairing professional equipment required light machine tools to make individual replacement parts if they could not be readily obtained from the original makers.

This group also inspected and modified equipment which was brought in from overseas to ensure it met local consumer and Australian standards. For example, projectors imported from Eastman Kodak required their transformers to be replaced with 240 volt units to meet local electrical standards.

Kodak manufactured and distributed a wide range of photographic products to Australasia, such as film, paper, chemicals, cameras and miscellaneous equipment. Its client base included amateur and professional photographers, as well as specialist medical and graphic art professionals who used photography, x-ray and other imaging techniques.

This photograph is part of the Kodak collection of products, promotional materials, photographs and working life artefacts collected from Kodak Australasia in 2005, when the Melbourne manufacturing plant at Coburg closed down.

Description of Content

Photograph of a man wearing an apron leaning on a work bench and operating a light engineers' lathe. This equipment is mounted on a bench with an engineers' vice to the left and drawer underneath. There are shelves above the work bench with a can of Shell oil, a can of paint and a small hacksaw.

Physical Description

Black and white, silver gelatin photograph printed on light weight paper, landscape format with a white border.

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