The Exakta: The Red Hot SLR of the Cold War, Part 1
How a “Communist” camera became a best seller in 1950s America
By Jason Schneider
For the last 20 years or so “Red,” as in “Red States” has been associated with the Republican party and conservative ideas, but back in the ‘50s everyone knew that the “Reds” were the Commies, probably because the flag of the USSR was totally red (denoting revolution) with a discreet gold hammer and sickle surmounted by 5-pointed gold star in the upper left-hand corner. During the Cold War, which started in 1947 and didn’t really end until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, most Americans believed that “the Reds” were our mortal enemies and that our overarching mission was to defeat communism. Anti-communist feelings in the U.S. reached a fever pitch during the 1950s and this antipathy extended to all Iron Curtain countries, mostly in Eastern Europe, then under Soviet domination.
In the very midst of this toxic political environment one idiosyncratic East German 35mm SLR—the Exakta— achieved a remarkable degree of success in the marketplace, and the undying adulation of myriad scientists and sophisticated photo enthusiasts. To understand how the Exakta attracted such a huge and loyal following despite its operational eccentricities and what many regarded as its unsavory provenance, it helps to start at the beginning. Placing the Exakta in its historical context and understanding what made it so attractive at the time will also give you a good idea why it’s still a favorite among vintage film shooters and camera collectors.
Announced with great fanfare in March,1936 by Ihagee (ee-ha-gay) Kamerawerk, Steenbergen & Co. of Dresden, Germany the Kine Exakta was the first commercially successful 35mm SLR in the world. The prefix “Kine” (a catalog designation that was never inscribed on the camera) referenced the fact that the Kine Exakta took 35mm cine film, usingthe standard 24 x 36mm still picture format. Ihagee’s first Exakta SLR, the VP Exakta of 1933, provided a 6 x 4.5cm format on 127 roll film. Moving to the increasingly popular 35mm format was a brilliant marketing decision and the Kine Exakta, which retained the distinctive trapezoidal form factor of the original VP Exakta body, was an instant worldwide success, especially in Germany, because it provided unique advantages.
Kine Exakta of 1936 with round magnifier was first widely marketed 35mm SLR
By modern standards the Kine Exakta is primitive, with a non-removable waist-level finder with built-in “press-down” magnifier, a standard uncoated 54mm f/3.5 Ihagee Exaktar lens (a rebadged Meyer Primotar) with a manually set aperture (not even a pre-set ring!), a very long throw, left-handed wind lever (the film runs right to left), and a front-mounted left-handed shutter release.
Kine Exakta of 1936-38 with rectangular magnifier.
On the plus side: 1. Its horizontal cloth focal plane shutter covers an impressive range of speeds from 12 sec to 1/1000 sec (though slow speeds of 1/10-12 sec are inconveniently but ingeniously set via the B setting, after you wind the knob that tensions the spring that’s also used to power the self-timer!) 2. Its robust, reliable 3-claw bayonet mount is secured with a simple external spring-loaded catch. 3. Winding the film to the next frame cocks the shutter, advances the (manually zeroed) additive frame counter one notch, and simultaneously lowers the mirror to viewing position—many earlier cameras required separate operations. 4. It has a built-in film knife for severing and removing the film that’s been exposed before the roll is completed, which makes a lot more sense when using cartridge-to-cartridge feed, as many did back in the day. 5. An interlock prevents the shutter from being fired until the viewing/focusing hood is raised.
Ad for Kine Exakta with rectangular magnifier in Popular Photography, Nov. 1938
Of course, the Kine Exakta’s signature feature, the one that made it the darling of the scientific-medical community and everyone else, is the fact that it’s asingle lens reflex (SLR), indeed the first widely available 35mm camera to provide parallax free viewing with any lens that can be mounted and focused on the camera. Indeed, thiscapabilitynot only established the Exakta brand, but also made the SLR the dominant camera type from the late 20th century well into the digital era. The story of the Exakta’s success against all odds in a politically hostile environment is really a testament to its optical flexibility, the vision of those who saw its potential for future development, the world’s lens makers that created literally hundreds oflenses of every imaginable type in Exakta mount, and the engineers that transformed it into the first true 35mm SLR system of photography. The fact that they were able to evolve the system based on a module that retained so many features of the original Kine Exakta is nothing short of astonishing.
How a “Communist” camera became a best seller in 1950s America
By Jason Schneider
For the last 20 years or so “Red,” as in “Red States” has been associated with the Republican party and conservative ideas, but back in the ‘50s everyone knew that the “Reds” were the Commies, probably because the flag of the USSR was totally red (denoting revolution) with a discreet gold hammer and sickle surmounted by 5-pointed gold star in the upper left-hand corner. During the Cold War, which started in 1947 and didn’t really end until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, most Americans believed that “the Reds” were our mortal enemies and that our overarching mission was to defeat communism. Anti-communist feelings in the U.S. reached a fever pitch during the 1950s and this antipathy extended to all Iron Curtain countries, mostly in Eastern Europe, then under Soviet domination.
In the very midst of this toxic political environment one idiosyncratic East German 35mm SLR—the Exakta— achieved a remarkable degree of success in the marketplace, and the undying adulation of myriad scientists and sophisticated photo enthusiasts. To understand how the Exakta attracted such a huge and loyal following despite its operational eccentricities and what many regarded as its unsavory provenance, it helps to start at the beginning. Placing the Exakta in its historical context and understanding what made it so attractive at the time will also give you a good idea why it’s still a favorite among vintage film shooters and camera collectors.
Announced with great fanfare in March,1936 by Ihagee (ee-ha-gay) Kamerawerk, Steenbergen & Co. of Dresden, Germany the Kine Exakta was the first commercially successful 35mm SLR in the world. The prefix “Kine” (a catalog designation that was never inscribed on the camera) referenced the fact that the Kine Exakta took 35mm cine film, usingthe standard 24 x 36mm still picture format. Ihagee’s first Exakta SLR, the VP Exakta of 1933, provided a 6 x 4.5cm format on 127 roll film. Moving to the increasingly popular 35mm format was a brilliant marketing decision and the Kine Exakta, which retained the distinctive trapezoidal form factor of the original VP Exakta body, was an instant worldwide success, especially in Germany, because it provided unique advantages.
Kine Exakta of 1936 with round magnifier was first widely marketed 35mm SLR
By modern standards the Kine Exakta is primitive, with a non-removable waist-level finder with built-in “press-down” magnifier, a standard uncoated 54mm f/3.5 Ihagee Exaktar lens (a rebadged Meyer Primotar) with a manually set aperture (not even a pre-set ring!), a very long throw, left-handed wind lever (the film runs right to left), and a front-mounted left-handed shutter release.
Kine Exakta of 1936-38 with rectangular magnifier.
On the plus side: 1. Its horizontal cloth focal plane shutter covers an impressive range of speeds from 12 sec to 1/1000 sec (though slow speeds of 1/10-12 sec are inconveniently but ingeniously set via the B setting, after you wind the knob that tensions the spring that’s also used to power the self-timer!) 2. Its robust, reliable 3-claw bayonet mount is secured with a simple external spring-loaded catch. 3. Winding the film to the next frame cocks the shutter, advances the (manually zeroed) additive frame counter one notch, and simultaneously lowers the mirror to viewing position—many earlier cameras required separate operations. 4. It has a built-in film knife for severing and removing the film that’s been exposed before the roll is completed, which makes a lot more sense when using cartridge-to-cartridge feed, as many did back in the day. 5. An interlock prevents the shutter from being fired until the viewing/focusing hood is raised.
Ad for Kine Exakta with rectangular magnifier in Popular Photography, Nov. 1938
Of course, the Kine Exakta’s signature feature, the one that made it the darling of the scientific-medical community and everyone else, is the fact that it’s asingle lens reflex (SLR), indeed the first widely available 35mm camera to provide parallax free viewing with any lens that can be mounted and focused on the camera. Indeed, thiscapabilitynot only established the Exakta brand, but also made the SLR the dominant camera type from the late 20th century well into the digital era. The story of the Exakta’s success against all odds in a politically hostile environment is really a testament to its optical flexibility, the vision of those who saw its potential for future development, the world’s lens makers that created literally hundreds oflenses of every imaginable type in Exakta mount, and the engineers that transformed it into the first true 35mm SLR system of photography. The fact that they were able to evolve the system based on a module that retained so many features of the original Kine Exakta is nothing short of astonishing.
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