Trying out the new forum - Modern Film Cameras?

<p><strong>Trying out the new forum - </strong><br /><strong>I suggest "Modern Film Cameras" is a nice neutral term with lots of pleasing ambiguity.</strong><br>

<br /><br />According to Wikipedia:</p>

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<p>1969 PRAKTICA LLC is the first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with electrical diaphragm simulation between interchangeable lenses and camera body by VEB Pentacon.<br /><br /></p>

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<p>Now someone (namely me) will ask if this degree of simple electric connection qualifies the later Prakticas as the first cameras that qualify for this new forum? <br /><br />Of course, there had been meter linked more-or-less automatic cameras of one sort or another going back to before WWII. Yet there is something novel about the later Prakticas.<br /><br />There will be no doubt by anyone, I would guess that cameras like the Maxxum 7000. about which Wikipedia again says</p>

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<p><br />The Minolta MAXXUM 7000 (7000 AF in Europe) 35mm SLR camera was introduced in 1985. It marked a significant milestone in photography as it was the first camera to feature both integrated autofocus (AF) and motorised film advance, the standard configuration for later amateur and professional single lens reflex cameras.</p>

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<p><br />I would go so far as to say that the Maxxum 7000 is the "beau-ideal" of this new forum. The early Nikon AF cameras, the AF Canon FD camera, the early EOS, all are clear candidates regardless of where else they might fit in.<br /><br />But the Praktica? Can an M42 mount camera actually represent a milestone in the history of the 'electrification' of photography? After all it was made in Communist East Germany, and Lenin once said that Communism was land reform and electrification, didn't he? Here's lens reform and electrification, so?<br /><br />Anyhow, for your pleasure and edification I present the late state of "modern film cameras" in the Warsaw Pact. I have shot film through these cameras, but only test rolls for the shutter and so on, so this post will be only camera porn itself, not a ramble around my campus lake (cries of "awwww" or something like that).<br /><br />Here are an M42 "electric" Praktica EE2 camera and the next to the last model, sort of, of the Praktica line, the B-mount Praktica BX20.</p>

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<p>Here is the lens and camera body mount for the EE2.<br /> The EE2 is March 1977 to March 1979 production, Hummel Nr. 172.<br /> Note the three electric contacts on the lens, and the longer connections on the body to allow for variation in the screw thread. Clever. eh? or maybe kludge?<br /><br /><br />Don't the contacts remind you a little of those on your EOS camera?<br /><br /></p><div></div>

<p>Here is the later Praktica BX20 made from December 1987 to December 1990 (that is contemporary with the Maxxum and early EOS cameras. It is Hummel Nr 235.<br>

Perhaps we are seeing a sign here of why the DDR is not still around.<br /><br />Note the even more modern electric connections on the lens. Perhaps in a different world, this could have been a "contenda".</p><div></div>

<p>That's all folks, and by the way I am <strong>not</strong> trying to make this the JDM forum. :{<</p>

<p>I guess this forum would cover the Nikon FE, EM, F3, and up. Those all require battery power to do anything other than the basic 1/90 of second mechanical shutter speed.</p>

<p>Technical correction: Yes, I know that Lenin actually said in 1920 that "Communism is Soviet power plus the electrification of the entire country", but who cares? This is Photokistan and we can rewrite history if we want to.</p>

<p>Here is the above picture with the Revisionist camera blotted out, so as not to mislead the Parteigenossen.</p><div></div>

<p>While I wouldn't consider it a hard and fast rule, as there will be exceptions. A good place to start for this forum would be:</p>

<p>Requires Batteries = post here<br>

Doesn't require batteries = post in Classic Cameras Forum</p>

<p>But like I said, there will be exceptions. Probably any number of them.</p>

<p>As the manual for the Praktica EE2 says about non-automatic exposure:</p>

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<p>Though the shutter speed is metered no more, these speeds are still<br />electionically controlled, so that a battery is required.</p>

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<p>so it and the BX20 fit in nicely then. It takes a Varta V 21 PX. ;)</p><div></div>

<p>Looks like a Praktica-l solution.</p>

<p><em>"""Requires Batteries = post here</em><br /><em> Doesn't require batteries = post in Classic Cameras Forum""</em></p>

<p>I assume that batteries for "metering only" = Classic Camera Forum? Obviously every 35mm SLR from the 1960's and 1970's that was fully manual, fits the "metering battery only" designation.<em> </em></p>

<p>That said, I'm glad there is now a "classic" electronic camera forum. Cameras like the Olympus OM2, Nikon's FE & F3 ,and Canon's A1 & AE1 etc, are no less classic than their more manual bothers.<em><br /></em></p>

<p>Well said, Steve. I guess I'm a classic electronic camera user, having started out with the Nikon FE2 and now using the Nikon F3HP and Nikon F100. But shouldn't I post in the Nikon forum about these cameras instead of here? I suppose this forum is all-encompassing in terms of brands so either forum would be OK. Yet recently I saw a thread about Nikon cameras moved from another forum into the Nikon forum, so I am not so sure Nikon cameras can be discussed here without the thread being moved.</p>

<p><strong>JDM</strong>, that mount on the B-series was designed by Carl Zeiss Jena, I believe, initially for both the Pentax K plus cameras and the Praktica B-series. For some reason Pentax mount is slightly different from that of the B-series. Don't know which side changed the specifications; people like Tomosy have written that the two mounts are the same. Any way, it is another benign indicator of the long association between Asahi and Dresden since the days of the Praktiflex. sp.</p>

<p>Dave, you can post in the Nikon format with the film cameras you mentioned, but your post will drown in a digital ocean. BTW, I read you there often, another resident of the most enlightened region in the country</p>

<p>JDM, I have never owned a Maxxum, and so I wonder what it can do in the complete absence of batteries. My criterion is that if it remains fully functional, except for exposure information, then it qualifies for classic, if not, modern. The Konica auto S2 is an example. I can use sunny-16 in the absence of batteries, but I can't will my T90 to fire in such a case. I consider those cameras that limply offer one arbitrary shutter speed in the absence of batteries to be pretty much useless without batteries.</p>

<p>Subbarayan,<br>

I've heard that story too; and, even before you posted, I tried a Google™ for B, etc. and K--nothing definitive came up.<br>

I once went so far as to buy a K>EOS adapter to see if it would work with the B-mount. The short answer is 'no' although it sort of fits on, but not tightly.<br>

Of course there are <em>now</em> PB>EOS adapters on eBay: cheapest price (they appear to all be made the same place) is around US$20.</p>

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<p>I guess I'm a classic electronic camera user, having started out with the Nikon FE2 and now using the Nikon F3HP and Nikon F100. But shouldn't I post in the Nikon forum about these cameras instead of here?</p>

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<p>You can post in either, just don't post the same question in both.</p>

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<p>Yet recently I saw a thread about Nikon cameras moved from another forum into the Nikon forum, so I am not so sure Nikon cameras can be discussed here without the thread being moved.</p>

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<p>Yeah, that was a post about electronic Nikons in the Classic Camera Forums. Those cameras didn't fit the definition that the Classic forum operates under. Though, had it existed at the time, that particular question would have been equally relevant in this forum (Modern Film Cameras) as it would have in the Nikon forum.</p>

<p>I will, since I already have a fair representation of them myself, also point out that both the late Praktica Pentacon M42 lenses and the Praktica B Prakticar lenses are real Zeiss lenses of high quality, and even modern coatings, and often very inexpensive. They will work with adapters on many digital cameras in a total stop down, manual mode, of course. They sell for a lot less than C/Y lenses if you're looking for high quality manual focus lenses for your digital camera, and I do not think that most of them are inferior to the other late Zeiss offerings, even if they were made on the wrong side of the wall.</p>

<p>By the way, a few Praktica lenses, particularly zoom lenses in the 80s, were made in Japan for VEB Pentacon, and there are Japanese brand lenses in these mounts. Some lens production in Japan under names like Exaktar actually survived the DDR, usually in non-Praktica mounts.</p>

<p>Josh, thank you for the clarification. I can see this new forum will be popular with many p.net users.</p>

<p>I'd say the Nikon EM, FE, FE2, F3 do not require battery to shoot because you still can take a nice picture without battery</p>

<p>Slightly of topic but here goes;</p>

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<p>I will, since I already have a fair representation of them myself, also point out that both the late Praktica Pentacon M42 lenses and the Praktica B Prakticar lenses are real Zeiss lenses of high quality ... <snip>...and I do not think that most of them are inferior to the other late Zeiss offerings, even if they were made on the wrong side of the wall</p>

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<p>Even some of the zeiss lenses that where made on the 'right' side of the wall where made actually on the wrong side of the wall; It seems that the relation between Zeiss Jena and Zeiss Oberkochen only got sour, with the law suits on the name rights and all that after they secured enough production capacity. So somewhere after 1966-68. Before that some of the Western production was outsourced to the DDR.</p>

<p>I had wondered about that, Erwin.<br>

Interestingly, Carl Zeiss Jena (<a href="http://www.zeiss.com/C12571410035282A/?Open">link</a>) continues, under, as they say, new management again:</p>

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<p>We are a widely established company with facilities in Jena, Oberkochen and <strong>Minsk in Belarus</strong> - a flexible center of excellence for single components and for complex assemblies and modules. [emphasis added JDM]</p>

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