Can you I.D. the camera(s)?

[newspaperguy]

http://vfwpost2461.com/1945Photos/Image-7.jpg

How about the photog?

 

[Bill Clark]

Looks like Barnacks. I suppose they could be copies.

Info here see #7:

http://vfwpost2461.com/1945Photos/Rare Photos.htm

 

[bmattock]

I don't know when the Soviets began making copy cameras, but 1945 seems a bit early. I suspect liberated Leicas. I'm no expert though.

 

[mpaniagua]

Russian were making Fed1 as early as 1934 so it could be a Fed 1.

 

[nhchen]

There seems to be a slow speed dial on the front of the camera in the middle. So it can't have been a fed, more likely a leica.

nathan

 

[colyn]

There seems to be a slow speed dial on the front of the camera in the middle. So it can't have been a fed, more likely a leica.

nathan

I would agree since both cameras do have the slow speed dail which is not present on the Russian fakes.

 

[x-ray]

I don't know when the Soviets began making copy cameras, but 1945 seems a bit early. I suspect liberated Leicas. I'm no expert though.

My father shot images in Europe throught the war with a Russian Leica copy.

 

[BillBingham2]

The camera being used looks like it has a rigid 50mm lens, the other looks like it's not collapsible either, perhaps a 35mm, though there is no external finder on the camera. Could be a 50/3.5 of some type.

Perhaps Leica bodies and USSR glass?

 

[bmattock]

My father shot images in Europe throught the war with a Russian Leica copy.

Interesting, I did not know that, thanks!

 

[farlymac]

Perhaps they were "liberated" Leicas.

PF

 

[wolves3012]

The camera centre-shot is probably a Leica, due to the slow-speed dial. I've read, somewhere, that the russians *might* have produced a "copy" with such a dial but I've never seen anything definitively proving it. So, the probability is high that the cameras are not russian. The shot is just not high enough quality to say with any certainty though. The FED 1 was certainly being made well before WWII, so the right-hand one could be one.

 

[David Hughes]

Hi,

A lot of Leicas were captured during the war. I've read 1940's articles about them after they were captured. Usually bomber crews carried them. And Great Britain and the USSR were both bombed and so would have had the chance to recycle them as Leitz no longer supplied them direct. I thought that was obvious.

Leicas were also sold in the USSR and used, hence the FED copies; not fakes BTW.

BTW 2, my old office is still still standing in photo 17. Some of the stories I heard about conditions during the war would make your hair stand on end; and some would make you fall about laughing. Because it was important a lot of staff stayed overnight and that's when the fun and games started...

Regards, David

PS The caption to photo 13 is interesting, isn't it?

 

[Mr_Flibble]

I've seen numerous photos of WW2 Red Army War Photographers, most of them definitely seem to be armed with a Leica III or IIIa body. I found this odd as well, I expected them to have FEDs at least.

Here's the photo with caption

And a few others

The case does appear to have the FED logo in this one

 

[Waus]

I think the man on the left is Yevgeny Khaldei-the famous Russian war photographer:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Khaldei

 

[newspaperguy]

COLYN - NOT fakes.. German cameras made in Mother Russia." 🙄

 

[newspaperguy]

Thanks Rick... I knew you would have the resources at hand.