davidnewtonguitars
Family Snaps
The best source I know of to date FSU is
http://www.sovietcams.com/index.php?358713866
http://www.sovietcams.com/index.php?358713866
FSU cameras when they were new
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David Hughes
David Hughes
Hi,
It's rather like early Leicas; you just have to interpolate the numbers and guess...
Regards, David
It's rather like early Leicas; you just have to interpolate the numbers and guess...
Regards, David
Elmar Lang
Well-known
I need to say that in the '60s -for instance- USSR-made cameras were officially imported and distributed in Italy by the "F.O.S. -Foto Ottica Sovietica", then from their successors, the Atemsa and Antares. All firms connected to the Olivetti company of Ivrea.
Later -I mean in the 80's, Soviet cameras (along with the DDR-made Prakticas and Pentacon), were imported and distributed by Cattaneo of Genoa, formerly importers of the Leitz/Leica products.
I remember also, that the so-called "No-name Contax" (actually, a non-branded Kiev-4A, mounting a Zeiss Jena Sonnar 50/2 lens), was imported and distributed in the USA.
All, well earlier the fall of the Berlin wall...
Re. the blue jeans affaire, I've been an exchange student in Warsaw, in 1986 and 1987. Besides the shortage of many goods, western-made jeans were not rare to find and with some "creativity", many polish young people were able to buy them at the officially "for foreigners only" Pewex" stores.
Besides that, I don't think that the KGB would have taken to the Lubyanka or Lefortovo a guy buying a pair of jeans (different if it would have been a "financial activity" in order to accumulate US-Dollars).
Regarding the price of cameras, I should look for the "Preiskurant" indicated on some original cardboard box's labels, but I remember that the rangefinder Kiev-4 ranked among the expensive cameras.
Best wishes,
Enzo (E.L.)
IlyaB
Established
Those were the prices as I remember in the late sixties and early seventies. A loaf of bread was 0.12 RUB at that time, 0.5l Moskovskaya Vodka was 3.62RUB, 0.5l Stolichnaya Vodka was 4.12RUB 🙂 . My initial engineer salary was 120RUB (1978).
selfie 1966 by Ilya, on Flickr
Last edited:
emraphoto
Veteran
Russian Rangefinder forum has similar thread on ten pages.
http://rangefinder.ru/club/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=15404
I'm helping with translation here.
Somewhere in fifties prices went down.
Zorki-2C 700 RUB, FED-2 550 RUB, Kiev-III around 2000 RUB.
FSU prices from fifties are 10:1 to later prices due to money reform (10:1 devaluation).
1955 Official shipping catalog with prices.
Lubitel listed around 100 RUB. Smena 200 RUB. Zorki 705 RUB. Kiev 2000 RUB. Kiev 2340. Average monthly salary around 740 RUB.
Zenit C was 700 RUB in 1959 with average monthly salary of 770 RUB.
Here is the wages table (monthly payments),
http://opoccuu.com/wages.htm
years on the left, next to it is average FSU salary. I'm finding it accurate from what I have read and what I have myself.
1962 prices from Soviet book by Bunimovitch "Camera choice".
Keiv-Vega - 22руб.50 коп. Smena - 11руб, Smena-2 13 руб, Smena-5 - 9 руб. Smena-6 13 руб. 50 коп. Zarya - 27 руб. Unost 27 руб. Zorki-С 28 руб, Zorki-2С with Industar 30 руб. Zorki-4 with Jupiter 61 руб. Zorki-5 with Industar-50 28 руб. Zorki-6 with I-50 43 руб. Fed-2 with I-10 26 руб. Mir with I-50 35 руб, with J-8 48 руб. Drug - 70 руб. Kiev 111А (если 83 руб. Kiev 4А -115 руб. Kiev 4 - 125 руб. Leningrad 125 руб. Zenit-С 50 руб. Zenit-3 80 руб. Start -130 руб!!! Lubitel-2 10 руб. Lubitel 8 руб. Estafeta - 24 руб. Unikor 6 руб. 50 коп. Iskra 85 руб. Moskva-4 24 руб. Moskvа - 5 26 руб. Salut - 400 руб (!) FT-2 43 руб. Sputnik - 26 руб. Narziss - 85 руб (suggested).
Руб is Rubl. Коп is kopeyka (1 Rubl is 100 Kopeyek).
Average monthly salary in 1962 - 84 RUB.
In seventies prices went up due to new models. But they kept same manufacturing, pricing strategy.
Cameras like Lubitel and Smena were very affordable. Zorki, FED were one, half-salary range. SLRs and Kiev more expensive. Medium format was even more expensive.
Salut-S was 435 RUB in 1979, monthly average salary 150 RUB.
Da ztrastvuet Souz Sovetskih Sozialisticheskich Resbublic!
i love this forum
Elmar Lang
Well-known
A great contribution, thank you (btw, that catalogue of Soyuzposyltorg is a most interesting document.
Enzo (E.L.)
Enzo (E.L.)
ForestCap
Well-known
Philip Whiteman
Old hand returning to the fray
As a British teenager in the mid 1970s, Zorkis and Kievs were the only affordable way into 'quality' rangefinder photography - or they were, at least until my Dad presented me with the Leica IIIC in my avatar (long story, but he effectively got that one for free - and it was then a typical, tired 'spotty chrome' 1950 model).
I recall buying a Zorki for something like £18, and - one by one, as I earned money by painting windows at home - a set of Jupiter lenses for the same kind of price per item
I recall buying a Zorki for something like £18, and - one by one, as I earned money by painting windows at home - a set of Jupiter lenses for the same kind of price per item
Vadimson
Member
Speaking of slides, I've found and scanned one. People say it weren't Soviet or ORWO film.
Lost champions by mm35exp36, on Flickr
ORWOCHROM and other Soviet-era slides
http://club.foto.ru/forum/21/706757
Elmar Lang
Well-known
Actually, my first 35mm. camera, was a 1968-made Kiev-4A, bought back in 1975, when I was 16 years old. It was (almost) identical to my grandfather's Contax-II on which he taught me the fundamentals of photography and I could afford it with the money I was able to spare for the purpose of buying a good camera.
By the way, it still works flawlessly.
E.L.
By the way, it still works flawlessly.
E.L.
Roger Hicks
Veteran
someonenameddavid
Well-known
I remember in 1976 paying around £20 for a Zorki 4k in Cardiff, Wales . I was into potholing and wanted a decent camera, not my then current Nikkormat, to go down Ogof Ffynnon Ddu (take that autocorrect) and be able to use the split image rangefinder on a helmet lamp. Then I saw the bloke at the South Wales Caving Club with his Bronica and 6x6 slide show and was blown away...
nikonhswebmaster
Retired NHS Webmaster
The only source I remember was Cambridge Camera in NYC. And sometimes Olden advertized them.
Was Cambridge the only one importing them?
Roger Hicks
Veteran
A lot depends on what you call "West". Outside the USA, it applies to rather more than the USA.
Cheers,
R.
Cheers,
R.
radi(c)al_cam
Well-known
Elmar Lang
Well-known
Well, I don't think that the UK could have been particularly "friendly" with the USSR.
Italy held a different position perhaps, due to the fact that in my country took place the biggest and better organized communist party outside the Warsaw Pact; but I don't think that this could have been the true reason of the regular and official import of cameras and optical equipment from the USSR, DDR, Czechoslowakia, etc. as reported in my post no. 63.
By the way, my first Kiev-4A was of a very "parallel" import to Italy. It arrived to one of the many photo stores in Venice that were regularly supplied by Soviet and East German sailors arriving to Venice's Harbour aboard of merchant vessels.
Best wishes,
Enzo (E.L.)
tunalegs
Pretended Artist
Kalimar sold Zenits and Lubitels under their own brand for quite some time, I don't think soviet cameras were as rare in the U.S. as one might expect.
Roger Hicks
Veteran
Da, tovarisch.
Actually, my dear old great grandmother Florence was a Party member. Her father was a very, very rich man (owned Ellacott's ironworks) who made unwise investments and lost all his money. Flo then did what any sensible young woman of the time would do and joined the Party. Her children (including my grandmother) were on the hard left of the Labour Party. My father, her grandson, was on the soft left of the Conservative Party into his 30s or 40s, but then moved rightwards. Regression to the norm, perhaps.
Cheers,
R.
David Hughes
David Hughes
Hi,
I would have said that the main reason for the imports had nothing to do with politics but a lot to do with people buying cheap and selling dear.
BTW, I've a collection of old photographic magazines, from the 20's onwards, and the first mention of a USSR made camera came in the early 40's but the writer of the article said that he had heard rumours of it (the 30's FED) years ago but had never seen anything to confirm it. In the next edition of the magazine was a letter from someone with another FED 1 and he bought it thinking it was an export version of a Leica...
Regards, David
I would have said that the main reason for the imports had nothing to do with politics but a lot to do with people buying cheap and selling dear.
BTW, I've a collection of old photographic magazines, from the 20's onwards, and the first mention of a USSR made camera came in the early 40's but the writer of the article said that he had heard rumours of it (the 30's FED) years ago but had never seen anything to confirm it. In the next edition of the magazine was a letter from someone with another FED 1 and he bought it thinking it was an export version of a Leica...
Regards, David
Dralowid
Michael
Well many of our ex Public School/Oxbridge old boys seem to have been working for them in one capacity or another...
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