alan c.

M42Dave -- do you work on these lenses? Would happily send to you and pay a fair rate. I have done some DIY repairs but don't want to tackle this one. Thank you!

The cameras are built beautifully but way too complex, fragile, and eccentric to use. The lenses, however, are GREAT, and easily adapted even to Nikon F, although with some lenses there will be mirror clearance issues at various focusing distances, so best to use with LiveView or on mirrorless cameras. My favorites: the 50mm f/1.9 Xenon, the 45mm f/2.8 Xenar, and the 35mm f/2.8 Curtagon. They render beautifully and aren't expensive -- usually by buying camera with lens(es) being cheaper than lens alone.

"the F meters are serviceable if not particularly elegant" -- exactly! In 2020, if it isn't elegant, why use it? "Get ready to dig deep for a non-metered prism. My last one was close to $300, although part of that was the low SN and also the attached(working) clip-on Meter 2. The non-metered prisms are especially prone to silvering damage. F FTNs(the FTN is the last and best metered prism for the F) can often be had for $100-150." -- TRUE. But elegance always has a price tag. "I don't recommend mixing and matching F and F2 meter prism. First of all, the F2 prism is worth a pile of money-nearly as much as an F2AS. To fit it on an F, you'll have to remove the name plate on the camera. An F prism on an F2 just looks strange to my eye" -- putting F prism on F2 is what I'm talking about, it's totally fine. And other way around, what's in a name plate? Two screws, put in safe place. I agree that F2 is fine with meter because not so big as FTN and previous F meter heads. F with any meter is just too big and inelegant :) F with non-meter prism is almost a Leica. For these reasons I like the FM3a the best but truthfully I do shoot 35mm film these days it's usually on a Leica or a point-and-shoot. "I have a dozen F2s. Some are quiet and some are loud. Freshly serviced ones seem to mostly be quiet." -- I have never used an F2 as quiet as a F. I'm down to one F2A, and when it was freshly serviced by Sover Wong it was still loud. Have somehow accumulated a whole bunch of Fs with various prisms and meter heads and try to shoot a roll through them every year or two.

The reason the Lomo lens will be hard to focus on any SLR, film or digital, is because it lacks AUTO APERTURE -- if you want f/5.6, you must insert the waterhouse stop and that makes SLR mirror darker. Lenses made for the camera have auto aperture -- you always look through at widest open aperture for bright focusing and then aperture closes down only at moment of exposure and opens up again. MIRRORLESS systems have solved this issue because it adjusts -- even if you set the camera to "show what you get" as opposed to "always optimized no matter your exposure" -- the "what you get" at f/5.6 or f/8 or f/11 is still optimized to be easy to see and focus, not too dark. However -- you can argue that the WHOLE POINT of Petzval and other antique designs is to be shot WIDE OPEN almost always, to get swirly bokeh. Now -- for the camera -- what you want IS the original Nikon F body, BUT with the METERLESS prism that is smaller and more elegant than the boxy meter prisms of that era. The meters all need modification and service today, you don't them and for that reason the meterless prism is a lot more expensive than any metered head, opposite of 50 years ago LOL! Body without any prism is cheap; you most likely need to buy them separate because the metered heads were state of the art and more popular back then. I like Nikon F better than F2 because quieter shutter. F2 also came with a meterless head and the F ones will fit it too. F2 has 2000 highest shutter speed, hinged rather than Contax/Leica style back that completely comes off and falls into mud, higher speed flash sync if I remember right, and the meter heads for it are smaller and lighter and use modern batteries without modification. But it is LOUD. A beast. And the last meter heads, F2A and F2AS model, connect to modern AI and AIS lens without that silly earlier prong. FM is good. FM2 is louder shutter again. FM3A is last and best and expensive now. For battery powered, FE, FE2, FA, FG, F3 are all good. Avoid EM because no manual control of shutter speeds. F4 is a beast. F5 is still kind of a beast. F6 was a last hurrah and I've never seen one in the wild. F100, last of the smaller modern film cameras, is GREAT if you still want to use a film camera as an autofocus, program matrix metering, workhorse machine-gun. The very successful full frame digital D700, D600/610, D750, D800/810, etc., are all essentially digital versions of the film F100. Avoid all the semi-modern ones with Nxx or 4-numbers, although they are cheap: I've have found them fully working for $5 and $10. They are ugly, loud, and if you're gonna go that route go F100.

Does anybody have a recommendation for good repair technician for East German / Praktica / Pentacon gear? Must be somebody who is SPECIFICALLY expert in this area, please... I have a M42 Pentacon 29mm f/2.8 (the late successor to the Meyer) lens that has a loose focusing ring and also the pin that engages the A/M aperture and the sliding tab for that are both loose and inoperative. Thank you so much! Alan Chin

<p>Pete, could you please elaborate on how you got the K3 screen to stay in the camera? Did you have to modify or replace a part inside the camera? Thanks!</p>