johnnyh4
Small, 'semi-wide angle' mechanical camera
To supplement the 6x9 camera normally used for landscape-type photography, I wanted a 35mm film camera that had a wide angle lens whilst being as small as possible. I'm not interested in anything that requires batteries to function; it should be all mechanical. I love my Rollei 35, which can be used perfectly well without its battery, but that has a 40mm lens and for the purpose I wanted something with shorter focal length.
FED-2 cameras, and the INDUSTAR-69 28mm f/2.8 lenses used on the half-frame Chaika, are quite plentiful to buy. Although both use the L39 screw mount, the lens-to-film plane distance on the Chaika is slightly shorter than on the full-frame 'Leica compatibles', so the lens helicoid travel has to be taken further back beyond the Infinity position of the Chaika. (Some people report that they have had to grind surfaces down to allow the necessary travel; in this case the tolerances just stacked up nicely so that this was not necessary.)
I did not grind down the lens focussing ring either, so it 'bottomed' and locked the lens to fixed focus; this is intentional as I don't need variable focus for landscape [or, in daylight, for almost anything, with f=28mm ;-) ]
Small, 'semi-wide angle' mechanical camera
To supplement the 6x9 camera normally used for landscape-type photography, I wanted a 35mm film camera that had a wide angle lens whilst being as small as possible. I'm not interested in anything that requires batteries to function; it should be all mechanical. I love my Rollei 35, which can be used perfectly well without its battery, but that has a 40mm lens and for the purpose I wanted something with shorter focal length.
FED-2 cameras, and the INDUSTAR-69 28mm f/2.8 lenses used on the half-frame Chaika, are quite plentiful to buy. Although both use the L39 screw mount, the lens-to-film plane distance on the Chaika is slightly shorter than on the full-frame 'Leica compatibles', so the lens helicoid travel has to be taken further back beyond the Infinity position of the Chaika. (Some people report that they have had to grind surfaces down to allow the necessary travel; in this case the tolerances just stacked up nicely so that this was not necessary.)
I did not grind down the lens focussing ring either, so it 'bottomed' and locked the lens to fixed focus; this is intentional as I don't need variable focus for landscape [or, in daylight, for almost anything, with f=28mm ;-) ]