Honey, I grew the camera. This is a seriously large film SLR. Think of the Pentax 67, but one that rattles if you shake it. The original Kiev camera was a copy of the Pentacon Practisix medium format camera, which in time became the Pentacon Six. The Arsenal factory in Ukraine made a copy of the Practisix called the Kiev 6C in 1971. They then too did a redesign and brought out the Kiev 60 in 1984. (Are you still with me?). The main visible difference is that the 6C had its shutter release on the left of the camera, while the 60 has it on the right. It’s mounted on the front of the camera rather than the top, like a Praktica. The camera usually comes with a metering pentaprism and there is an optional waist level finder. It’s basically a giant version of a 35mm film SLR, so there’s nothing new to learn – no film magazines, no dark slides, no funny leaf-shutter lenses. If you can use a film SLR, you can use a Kiev.
The camera still uses the same lens mounting as the Pentacon, so you could use the well-regarded lenses that were developed for it. There is also a range of lenses made specifically for the Kiev, which can vary in quality. The Arsenal factory also made a Hasselblad camera copy called the Kiev 80 or 88. These used lenses with an odd screw/bayonet mount. What’s useful is that there is an adapter for these that lets them be used on the Kiev 60. This lets you use a possibly cheaper lens for a less popular camera.
The camera has a few known faults. The easiest to fix is to flock the inside of the camera to reduce reflections. There are pre-made kits available, or you can try some careful work with matt black paint. The main issue though is the frame spacing, as the frames can be too close together. I can usually get 13 shots on a film instead of the standard 12. There is a technique that helps. This requires that when you take a shot, you keep your finger pressed-down on the shutter release. While holding it down, you wind-on. This seems to increase the frame spacing a little and makes it more regular. The alternative is to get the spanners out – there’s an excellent resource here.
Otherwise, it’s a large SLR. The metering prism is a bit quirky though. You set the film speed and the lens maximum aperture on the meter dial, then switch it on to use it. You turn the dial until both red LEDs visible at the top of the viewfinder are on or flickering alternately. Then you look at the external dial and transfer the settings to the camera. Its only real advantage over a handheld meter is that it looks through the lens, so takes account of any light losses or close-focusing extension. In actual use I tend to use the metering prism rather than a hand-held meter as it is one less thing to carry.
One possible downside compared to a Hasselblad or RB67 is the flash sync speed of 1/30. This is slow because of the large focal plane shutter. It’s only really a concern if you are shooting with flash in daylight though, as balancing the background exposure may mean using a small aperture.
The standard lens used to be called a Volna but this got renamed to Arsat at some point. It’s an 80mm f2.8 and works fairly well. Mine came with a large rubber lens hood that is probably stiff and strong enough to be used as a weapon. The various Soviet lenses also tend to come with cases and filters too. The filters are usually green and yellow, as the cameras would usually have been shooting mono film.
There are a number of Soviet, Ukrainian and German lenses that fit the camera, thanks to its use of the Pentacon lens mount. The Pentacon mount must be the medium format version of the M42 or Pentax K mount. One of the Soviet options is a 30mm fisheye lens which is pretty extreme. The Pentax 67 offers a 35mm fisheye and Hasselblad listed a 30mm and even a 24mm. But ordinary mortals could afford the Arsat 30mm (also known as the Zodiac 8) and the other lenses in the range, so if you are prepared to risk Soviet quality control it is possible to build a medium format system for reasonable monies. By haunting eBay I gradually gathered these lenses:
- Mir 45mm wide-angle, equivalent to a 28mm on 35mm/full frame.
- Flektogon 50mm wide angle, equivalent to about a 30mm lens.
- Sonnar 180mm, equivalent to around 115mm.
- Jupiter 250mm, equivalent to around 155mm.
- Arsat 30mm, fisheye.
- Volna 80mm, standard lens.
The Sonnar and Flektogon are both Zeiss lenses meant for the Pentacon 6 and the 30mm is a screw-mount lens meant for the Kiev 88, but they all work on the Kiev 60. The Pentacon/ Kiev lens mount is an odd breech-lock arrangement. The lens has three ‘ears’, with one of them having a protruding register pin. Offer-up the lens to the camera so that this pin fits into a slot in the camera’s lens mount. Push the lens into the mount and twist an external ring. This then overlaps the ‘ears’ on the lens and locks it to the body. Be aware though that there is no lock or release button: twist the locking ring and the lens falls off. So be careful that you are turning the lens’s aperture ring and not the locking ring. But that aside, it’s possible to build a useful camera system with a range of lenses without having to sell body parts or your children.
Besides my collection, there’s a range of other lenses that fit. The joy for anyone with even a hint of lens snobbery is that they are all from the best lens makers. The Biometar-design standard lens is the same as used on Hasselblads, for example. I’ve put a table below of the available lenses, even though some of them are rarer than hen’s teeth.
There are also people like Hartblei who made reworked versions of the Kiev cameras and offered their own reworked lenses. They used to offer a couple of tilt/shift lenses at 45mm and 55mm lengths. If you want to completely geek-out on the lenses, their resolution and all that, then follow this link. Or you could just wonder what a 1000mm f5.6 mirror lens could be used for, especially as it weighs 14kg.
And how do cheap(ish) Soviet and East German lenses work on a clunky camera? Pretty well. The big negative needs less resolution anyway, as you need to enlarge it less, and you tend to stop down a bit because you can use a faster film without getting too grainy (the joys of big negatives). So if you want to explore the world of medium format, this can be a good way to try. You probably won’t want to carry all those lenses in one bag though. Medium format lenses are big and the Sonnar and Jupiter in particular are heavy. Be mindful that the lenses may not have the best coatings so can flare, but you can get some lovely big negatives with smooth tonality.
So much for the lenses; what’s it like to use the camera? Did I mention it’s big? Loading is a little different to 35mm. The back opens with a button on the bottom of the camera. At either side are twist and pull fittings that move the centre pins out and release the film spools. Swing the back open, load the new roll on the left and lead the front of the backing paper across the shutter and engage it in an empty spool on the right. Wind the paper across until the start mark lines-up with the register mark in the camera. Close the back and wind-on until the winder stops and the frame counter shows 1. The shutter speed dial is on the left side, where a 35mm camera would have the film rewind. You get more speeds than a leaf-shutter medium format camera, as you get 1/1000 at the top end courtesy of the focal plane shutter and it goes down to 1/2 and B. When you press the shutter the viewfinder will go dark because the mirror does not automatically return after shooting – you need to wind-on to cock the shutter and return the mirror. Expect a bit of noise when you press the shutter: there’s a big mirror and a lot of shutter curtain moving around. Oh, and the metering prism tends to be slightly loose in its retainer, so it rattles when the camera moves. It won’t fall off, but it’s scary until you know that. Otherwise it’s a giant SLR. One other thing – the tripod socket is the larger 3/4″ continental size, but you can get an adapter to bring it down to the common 1/4″ thread. Another quirk is the flash bracket. The camera itself has no flash shoe, just a PC socket. There is a separate metal arm with a flash shoe that screws into the front of the camera and holds the flash to the left of the prism. It doesn’t feel too secure to me, so if I ever did use flash it would probably be on a bracket that screws into the tripod socket (or studio flash).
The viewfinder is surprisingly sophisticated. It has a microsprism circle and a split-image. You can also easily replace the prism with a waist level finder if that’s your thing. It has a magnifier and a sports finder, so you can pretend it’s a Rolleiflex if you want to.
So what you get is an SLR with metering and a range of lenses. Think of this thing as a grown-up Pentax Spotmatic. Actually, it’s more like a Pentax MX, as it will take a wide range of lenses but has a fairly traditional cloth shutter and build. Or think of it as a medium format camera that is easier to use and more adaptable than a TLR.
Where do you go to buy one? There’s the usual auction site or you could also look at one that is guaranteed to work from Arax or Hartblei.