Yashica's 1972 scale-focus AE compact — Yashinon 38mm f/2.8, Copal shutter to 1/650s, CdS auto exposure, hot shoe.
The Yashica 35-ME is a compact 35mm viewfinder camera introduced by Yashica of Japan in around March 1972, part of the wave of small auto-exposure compacts that followed the Electro 35 rangefinders. It offered Electro-style automation in a simpler, cheaper scale-focus body, sold in black or silver metal finishes, and sits below the Electro 35 series in Yashica's early-1970s range.
The lens is a Yashinon 38mm f/2.8 of four elements in three groups, taking 46mm screw-in filters, with focus set by distance scale rather than a rangefinder. A Copal shutter is set automatically by the CdS meter across roughly 1/30 to 1/650s, with apertures from f/2.8 to f/14, and the chosen speed shows on a scale in the bright-line viewfinder, which carries parallax marks for close framing. A hot shoe and frame counter sit on the top plate.
In use it is a pleasing street and travel camera: genuinely pocketable for a metal 1970s compact, quiet, and quick once zone focusing becomes habit. The sharp four-element Yashinon is its main draw at today's prices, giving results close to pricier fixed-lens rangefinders of the era. Exposure is fully automatic with no manual override, so it rewards negative film and forgiving light.
Because exposure is entirely meter-driven, a dead or erratic CdS cell makes the camera unusable, so confirm the finder's speed needle responds to light with a fresh cell fitted, and budget for an adapter if the original battery type proves obsolete. Check the shutter fires cleanly, the aperture blades are oil-free, the scale-focus helical turns smoothly and the light seals are serviceable.