My new Kiev-4 - Review

I still can't, for the life of me, figure out where to take the shutter speed/aperture readings off the light meter on my Kiev 4.
 
kvanderlaag said:
I still can't, for the life of me, figure out where to take the shutter speed/aperture readings off the light meter on my Kiev 4.
Set the inner ring under the rewind knob so your ASA/ISO or a something reasonably close to it is lined up with the red arrow.
Mine has the progression 8 15 32 65 130 250 500, so 400 is somewhere between 250 and 500.
You then open the meter flap and turn the outer dial under the rewind knob until the pointer is lined up with the diamond in the window.
The outer dial is shutter speeds and the inner is apertures. Simply tranfer the combination you like to the camera.

Peter
 
kvanderlaag said:
I still can't, for the life of me, figure out where to take the shutter speed/aperture readings off the light meter on my Kiev 4.

There's a nice on-line manual for the Kiev here . It has a section on the light meter.
 
Oh, I'd completely missed that it just lined up pairings of apertures and shutter speeds. Silly mistake! Thanks again, RFF, for being so understanding even in the face of stupid mistakes!
 
peterc said:
That's a beauty! Now I have to go an clean the drool out of my keyboard
:bang:

Thanks Peter. Another Ontarian I see!

Here's a bit of a beater Contax II that I fixed up for an online buddy. He did a nice studio shot of it on the grid. Turned-out very well as a nice user camera - not perfect but not so flawless that he'll leave it locked up.

You have to feel the focus helical on a properly done prewar Contax to believe it. Even smoother than the postwar which has another gear in the train, which also makes the wheel turn the wrong way!
 
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Mister_Hat said:
You'll love the Kiev. The things take great pictures and they're built like tanks.

Tanks of what?


But hey, what do I know, I'm a Drug user... [FSU in-joke]
 
I actually noticed before that Contax/Kiev resembles somewhat the lines of Panzer mk III. Must be the same design house :)
 
darkkavenger said:
You will love your Kiev camera, it is really unique in the FSU world!

Uh, that is not "exactly" true....as the currently made Kiev 88CM medium-format camera is based on the first Hasselblad medium format camera. Some say that the tooling for that was made available to the Soviets 40 years ago or so, when Hasselblad went from a focal-plane shutter design to a inter-lens leaf shutter design.

Both the Current Kiev medium format cameras, and your Kiev 4 came/come from the same Arsenal plant in Ukraine.
 
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