Zenit S, first Soviet SLR

The Zenit S is the first Zenit SLR camera. It uses the body of the Zorki and the M39 lens thread, but the lens is mounted further in front of the film, so the M39 Fed/Zorki lenses cannot fit. These lenses are only suitable for Macro work

Mine had the common Industar 50mm/f3.5 lens, in M39 mount, which is small and sharp.
The camera has no metering aid, an external lightmeter is needed to select the aperture/shutter speed settings.
The camera has a very difficult way to load the film throufh a slit in the bottom, needs care or else the film will be munced up and there is no way to get into the camera's inside.

After I made it with the film I took some samples using the standard 50mm lens but also some Fed/Zorki lenses for macro.

Here are the results
with the standard Industar 50mm/f3.5

Shop display

Barking dog

 Chicken for sale

Roadworks

With the Jupiter-8 50mm/f2 for Fed and Zorki
Only macro is available

With the Industar - 22 5cm/f3.5 retractable lens there is a small flexibility to focus a little further

Fujica MA-1, red point and shoot camera

The Fujica MA-1 is a very simple plastic camera. Mine is red. It does not need focussing. It only has three settings on the lens, Bright and Hazy sun and a setting for flash, focuses closer to 1-3 meters.

There was film left in it which I processed and scanned at the lab.
The film was old, damaged and fogged. I used a lot of post processing to make the photos a bit more appealing.
It seems that the camera can take some good pictures in sunny conditions. I will try it later...

Exa, some more

The Exa is a difficult to use manual camera

Some more samples with the Exa camera

Elicon 35CM, some more

 Some more pictures from the Elicon 35CM

The pop up flash gets easily disengaged and drains the batteries. If the batteries are dead the Auto Exposure system does not work, the shutter fires but the blades do not open. The user thinks he took a photo but in reality there was not an image recording.

Some more samples

Exa, another difficult trial

The Exa is an SLR with a waist level viewfinder. Focusing is difficult, there is magnification glass but you must put the camera on your eye then compose the frame with the camera at waist level. It takes time and it's difficult.

I had another try with a 200 ASA film. I got many out of focus pictures. When I used the Meritar 50mm lens the pictures were blurred around the corners, I don't know, is it a low quality lens?

Here are some samples

Promenade at the beach of Loutraki, Corinth.

 

 A walk at Rafina's fish market and cafes

 A portrait with the Meyer Optik Goerlitz Trioplan 100mm/f2.8 I had a great difficulty to focus, then compose the picture.

Elikon 35CM, plastic, sharp but slow

This is a soviet clone of the Konica C35 AF camera, but does not have autofocus. It is the same camera with the Elikon 35C, plus it has a lever to select the aperture manually in case the batteries are not working.
When shooting manually the shutter speed defaults to 1/125th.
The lens is a sharp Industar 38mm with a maximum aperture of f 2.8
With the automatic setting the aperture ranges from f 2.8 to 16 and the speeds are from 1/8 to 1/500.

The lens may be sharp but the camera needs a steady hand, as it selects low shutter speeds that are prone to camera shake.
I loaded a 400 ASA film in it and got out to shoot candids but I got shaken pictures.
However the exposure system is accurate.

Here are some samples