Graflex 2 x 3 Speed Graphic press camera: Lieutenant Alan Queale, Official Photographer, BCOF

Graflex 2 ¼ x 3 ¼ inch Miniature Speed Graphic press camera. The body is made of mahogany bound with black leather. Pushing the covered button on the top of the camera releases the lens bed, which folds down revealing a leather bellows and a focussing rail along which the bellows and lens can slide; a pair of chromed focussing knobs at the front of the bad controls this movement. The lens (a Tessar 10.5cm f=1:4,5) is mounted on a Compur-Rapid Deckel-Munchen shutter, itself mounted on steel plate; a clamp lens release above allows for quick lens changes. The lens is equipped with shutter release and timing levers. The position of the lens holder can also be altered vertically with a pair of chrome plated clamp knobs on either side of the lens frame. The top of the lens holder features two screw holes which originally secured, a now missing, a folding wire frame finder (or sports viewfinder as it was known).

The right hand side of the camera features a vertical range finder engraved on the front KALART SYNCHRONIZED FINDER with one clear and one yellow lens. Behind this are situated the focal plane shutter control panel with (from top) the shutter winding key; the slit apeture window; the shutter release lever (cable or manual); a spring tension window; and a spring tension control wheel.

The rear of the camera holds a focal plane shutter with a flip-up viewer. This is attached to the camera by means of sliding clamps and can be replaced with a 2x3 magazine film holder or a 120 film roll holder. At the top left of the rear is a two pin attachment for the flash focal plane synchronisation.

The left hand side bears a stout leather vertical strap for holding the camera. The top features two viewfinders - a centrally placed folding peep sight, and, to the right, a tubular view finder with a round adjustment wheel situated at the back with 4 feet, 8 feet, 15 feet and infinity markings. At the front of the viewfinder there is an removable alloy aperture which shows the view obtained. This can be slid up and replaced by other masks.

The base is equipped with a screw fitting for a tripod.

Alan Queale was born in Boonah, Queensland on 16 November 1908 and enlisted in June 1940. Under service number QX6717 he served in the Middle East with 2/1 and 2/2 Ordnance Stores as a technical storeman from September 1940 until January 1943, reaching the rank of sergeant.

During his time in the Middle East, he used a simple Ensign Double 8 still camera to privately produce six albums of photographic portraits and studies of buildings, a format he would reproduce when he worked in Japan. Arriving back in Australia, he was transferred to 2 Base Ordnance Depot in Melbourne before being transferred to Australian New Guinea Administrative Unit (ANGAU) in March 1944, serving with them in New Guinea (an experience he found "rubbish"). He applied for a transfer to the Military History Section in July 1945, where he worked with No 2 Military History Field Team in New Guinea until February 1946.

Queale worked with the Military History Section (MHS) from 1946-47 in Japan, photographically documenting the activities of the British Commonwealth Occupation Force (BCOF) and aspects of Japanese life post-war, including the demilitarisation of the country, before being made the Officer in Charge (with the rank of lieutenant) of the MHS from February 1947 to March 1949. His photos from his service in the Middle East as well as Japan are searchable under his name on the AWM database.

After he was discharged from the Army in August 1949, Queale continued to take and collect photographs, and became well-known in Queensland for his work as an amateur historian and collector of art and artifacts. His work is notable for its unusually fine aesthetic values, as well as for what it reveals about Australia’s view of Asia in the immediate post-war period.

This Graflex 2 ¼ inch x 3 ¼ inch Miniature Speed Graphic press camera was likely purchased towards the end of 1946 and was state of the photographer’s art at the time. Graflex made larger formats - 3¼ x 4¼ inch, 4 x 5 inch and a 5 x 7 inch - and brought the 2 ¼ x 3 ¼ inch (or 2 x 3 for short) out in 1939. Although slow to operate, the Graflex range were superior cameras, with options of using three viewfinders, film carriers and either a focal-plane shutter or a lens shutter. The type of photographic work that Queale specialised in – studies of architecture and individuals, rather than action images – would work very well with this camera.