Zenit ?

Elmer Fishpaw

Elmer Fishpaw

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Just curious why Zenit doesn't jump into the rangefinder market. They have a decent selection of modern cameras, and there's many people in the Russia and surrounding areas, and the old Soviet stuff does OK on Ebay.
 
Did they ever make 'em? I had a Zenit 3M many moons ago, it had a Leica screw thread but that was the closest it got to being a RF cam.

I think the company simply focused on SLRs, and they did a pretty good job too!

 
Kim Coxon said:
I am not an expert but wasn't Zenit and Zorki basically the same company?

Kim
Click to expand...

Exactly the same, Kim - both ranges are products of KMZ.

Designs for an improved Zorki RF - the Zorki 35M - reached prototype form in the early 1970s, but the camera was never manufactured. When Zorki 4K production ceased in 1978, I think it was generally agreed that Rangefinders were obsolete and SLRs were the wave of the future 😀

In a sense, this decision reflected well on KMZ; the company had access to sufficient funding and research to launch new products and develop a surprisingly diverse range of SLRs. In contrast, cash-starved FED simply carried on making more-or-less the same old camera.

I believe that KMZ have scaled back SLR production in the face of digital competition. A revived Zorki would certainly appeal to our niche market, but I doubt it would be considered commercially viable. A similar project - the FED 6 - apparently was not
 
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peter_n said:
Did they ever make 'em? I had a Zenit 3M many moons ago, it had a Leica screw thread but that was the closest it got to being a RF cam.

I think the company simply focused on SLRs, and they did a pretty good job too!

Click to expand...

Zent 3m was my first camera in childhod. This gear was not really good but we still regret that the production of these legendary film cameras came to an end in 2005. Now they produce only Horizon-perfekt and Horizon-kompakt (both panoramic) and a couple of m42 lenses. I am sure that it was a big mistake in late 70s - early 80s to stop the rangefinders production and concentrate totally on SLR.

By the way, recently I experimented with old and scratched J-9 (m39 for SLR). I put it with 2 adapters on my 20d, took some spontaneous pictures. I was shocked (in good sense) with its quality. I`d like to say that it`s compared with my L optics. Here you can see an example (f2.8, flash up) http://www.pbase.com/andy_v/image/55148158
 
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Ah, whenever anyone mentions Zenit, I get fond memories of the Zenit-E (M42-slr, no TTL) that started photography for me in 1977. A shutter/mirror assembly that shook so badly that it made the tripod fall over, but it kept working without a single failure for 20 years..
 
No way! Zenit is my first real film camera, too. My first brush up with the Zenit was last year... in my first year of college. I bought a Zenit B on fleabay. Why? I believed that having an old camera would allow me to take pictures that looked vintage, in the sense of old postcards or old Soviet tank commander propaganda pictures. WRONG. WRONG.

I received a Zenit B with a Industar 61 L/Z in the yak hair + paperbag paper. I loaded it up with film I had on hand, and shot away. (Of course, for a first timer with absolutely no experience at all, errors occur.) I misplaced the negatives, but half of the film was messed up because I shot at f/2.8 most of the time (even in sunny days with 400ASA film.) Surprisingly, the shots that were usable were tack sharp. Better than my decent P&S digital camera.

That Zenit B died, but it paved a way to FSU gear, RF, and classic camera fever (you guys call it GAS here).
 
Elmer Fishpaw said:
Just curious why Zenit doesn't jump into the rangefinder market. They have a decent selection of modern cameras, and there's many people in the Russia and surrounding areas, and the old Soviet stuff does OK on Ebay.
Click to expand...

KMZ, Zenit's maker was in the business of making rangefinders before they made SLRs. The first Zenit was really a Zorki fused with a reflex housing. Thus the first Zenit retained the LTM 39 mount but not the optical register.

Someone once mentioned that KMZ often took cues on what to produce based on what they saw happening in tradefairs like Photokina. So sometime in 1975 or 1977, they saw that SLRs were the way of the future and that RFs were out (we know now that it did not happen) so they stopped making the Zorki and scrapped its manufactory tools and equipment. Sad and stupid action.

KMZ could catch on the niche market of making inexpensive, manual exposure only digital SLRs- imagine a Zenit 122 with a digital back: M42 manual focusing and manually set expsures and sells for about US $200?

Jay
 
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