Praktica page

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Praktica page

RAKTICAS were a Dresden-built dynasty of single lens reflexes that had their origin back in 1938 with the Praktiflex, and continued through to the 1980s. They were made by Kamera Werkstatten in Dresden which later changed its name to Kamera und Kinowerke and then under the East German communist regime became VEB (Peoples’ Factory) Kamera und Kinowerke. Later, the company was absorbed into VEB Pentacon.
In the 1960s, Prakticas were sold in the UK at very low prices, probably heavily subsidised to bring much-needed Western currency into East Germany. It made them excellent value for money and they sold in their thousands, but it also tended to cheapen them in the eyes of the general public and, later, those of collectors. It’s only relatively recently that their worth as reliable picture-taking machines has become appreciated. For a few months after the war the build quality was a little on the rough side because of difficulties with production and reassembling skilled staff in Dresden which had been near enough destroyed in 1945. Morale at KW was sais to have been very low. These dificulties were soon overcome, and though Prakticas may not have quite the same build quality as the top Japanese SLRs they’re well made and have a good name for reliability.
Another big bonus is that Prakticas (not Pentax) were the first cameras to use the 42mm lens thread. This means that until the B Series, with bayonet lenses, in 1980, the range of lenses available to fit Prakticas is vast. Be careful though, because until the Praktica FX2 in 1956, there wasn’t an automatic diaphragm lever behind the lens mount, so auto diaphragm lenses can’t be used on pre-1956 Prakticas unless the lenses have provision for manual stop down. At the moment I find Prakticas in car boot sales and flea markets don't fetch much more than Zenits, and I've got several non-workers for donor cameras.

THE latest addition to my Praktica collection is the oldest. It is a Praktica VF which, together with the VFB (B for Belichtungsmesser, or light meter) is regarded by some people as the best mechanical camera Praktica built. Some say it’s also the ugliest, and with its tall forward-sloping pentaprism it certainly does look at little ungainly compared with modern more sleekly styled SLRs. It was in production for only a year, 1964 to 1965 so compared with the Novas and the L series it’s relatively scarce these days. I hadn’t seen one in good condition and at the right price for years until recently when I was offered a very nice one at the same time and at the same price as an MTL5. I hadn’t got an MTL5 so bought both. The standard lens with the VF, according to the handbook, was a Meritar but I don’t regard this as the finest triplet Ludwig ever made so I was pleased that the one I was offered was fitted with an f/2.8 Tessar.
After putting a film through it I can see why Praktica collectors hold it in high regard. In a few words, it’s a very nice camera to use with a feeling of solid quality that the later mechanical Prakticas, good cameras though they are, haven’t quite got. It’s also got a couple of useful and unusual features. Have you ever come across another camera with both

The best mechanical Praktica?

knob and lever wind? The VF has. It’s got a knob wind on the top plate and a single-stroke lever wind on the bottom plate which you can use without taking the camera away from your eye. Take your choice. At the end of the first film I started to turn the rewind knob and found, almost by accident, that it’s in two parts. You lift the top half and turn it, and it becomes a very comfortable crank wind, much easier to use than the tiny little folding knob on most crank winds.
Quality and useful aside, it’s got a few other features I’m not over keen on. I’m not a great fan of the speed selector. I hadn’t seen a handbook when I put the film through it, and it took me a time to figure out the shutter speed settings. I could see that the tiny numbers ran from ½ sec to 1/500 sec, but some of the figures were in black and some in red. Then I twigged it. On top of the speed selector, with its lift and turn ring, is a slightly smaller knob with a red arrow on it. There are two corresponding arrows on the top plate. To select the black speeds, 1/30 sec up to 1/500 sec, you turn the top knob so its arrow points to the black arrow on the top plate. To select the red speeds, from 1/10 sec to ½ sec you turn the top knob to bring its arrow in line with the black arrow on the top plate. I believe this is a feature it shares with some of the early Novas. Easy enough once you get the hang of it, but nothing like so easy nor so convenient as the larger plain black single dial on later Prakticas. I was a bit disappointed that it hadn’t got a 1/15sec speed. After 1/30 sec the next slow speed is 1/10 sec, and I tend to use 1/15 sec quite a lot for available light shots indoors. For a couple of shots where it was too dim for using available light I wanted to use a small flash, and there are two co-ax flash sockets one above the other on the top plate. Which one should I use? I had to take the camera into brighter light before I could read, embossed in very small letters in the leatherette covering, an X above the top socket and an F below the bottom one. Clearer markings would have been easier to see. It was a good job I had a flash bracket in my camera case because there isn’t an accessory shoe. I don’t like using a camera in its ever-ready case, but found I couldn’t use one of my usual neck straps. The strap lugs aren’t really lugs, they’re buttons. You have to use a strap with special end fittings, or do as I did, take the metal rings off one of my neck straps and use just the slots in the ends of the leather which, I will agree, makes it less likely that the strap ends will scratch the body.
No doubt anyone used to a Praktica IV or V – I gather the V was pretty much the same as a IV with an instant return mirror – will just shrug their shoulders about these points. But for anyone not used to handling the camera little things like that can be annoying. It’s definitely a camera to which the saying ‘When all else fails, read the instructions’ applies. Ok I’m nit picking. I still like the beast.

THE Praktica Nova, or New Praktica, was introduced in 1965 and superseded after about a year or so by the Praktica Nova I with a much better one-piece speed setting dial and a rapid loading system with a baling arm which came over on the take-up spool and gripped the film.
I bought my Nova I new in 1967 with an f/2.8 Tessar. It’s had a lot of films through it since then, and never given any problems. The lens gives a good performance even though some people

The Nova I and Nova IB were identical except for the built-in selenium meter.

say that the f/2.8 Tessar wasn’t as good as the f/3.5 version unless you stopped it down well. I’m happy enough with it and don’t expect it to be quite up to the standard of some other much more expensive 42mm six-glass lenses. Mind you, six-glass lenses don’t have to be expensive. In particular, I’ve also used some Russian six-element lenses on the Nova with excellent results.
     Much more recently I picked up a Nova Ib for a ridiculously silly low price at a car boot fair. It’s pretty much the same as the Nova I except that it’s got a built-in selenium light meter just in front of the pentaprism, the b after the model number standing for Belichtungsmesser, or light meter.
     When I picked it up I thought it was a little odd because it hadn’t even got the word Praktica, let alone a model designation, on it anywhere. It was completely nameless. The only identifying marks on the camera itself were the Pentacon Tower stamped under the lens flange together with the figure 1 in a triangle which was Pentacon’s way of signifying that a camera had passed inspection as top quality suitable for export. I gather that the slightly lower quality ones were for sale in Easy Germany only, though plenty of them have since found their way into other countries. The ever-ready case also has the Pentacon Tower on it. Both the case and the camera are in completely unmarked condition and I don’t think very many films could have been through it. The shutter is the sweetest working Praktica shutter I’ve come across. I innocently asked the stallholder what make it was. “Oh, it’s a Russian,” he said. I just said, “Oh, I see,” because it was so obviously a Praktica.
     I pointed out that the glass front on the light meter was missing, and that was when the penny dropped. I’d forgotten that the name plate for the Nova Ib was also the glass in front of the light meter cell. For the moment I’ve cut a piece of plain glass from a slide mount to go in there. Maybe I’ll find an otherwise broken Nova Ib sometime with a sound glass. It’s fitted with Meyer’s f/2.8 Domiplan lens. It isn’t a bad lens so far as cheap lenses go, certainly better than the Meritar, but it’s only fair-to-middling by Meyer’s standards as the company made some really excellent lenses. The Domiplan’s OK if you stop it down a bit but it can’t compete with a six-glass lens, or even a Tessar. Quality improves as you stop down, but starts to fall off a bit if you stop right down to f/22.
     But most pictures are taken between f/5.6 and f/11, and hey, what do you want from a lens that sold at a very low price even when it was new? The average amateur who didn’t do his own printing, and got 6x4 ich prints from his local D&P (Developing and Printing, now usually called One-Hour Fast Print) shop, would probably regard the results as needle sharp. The meter works – just – but it’s about two stops slow so either the selenium cell’s feeling its age or there's a dirty contact somewhere. I very seldom use a built-in meter unless it’s a TTL so I probably won’t bother about it. I’ve got plenty of other cameras awaiting more serious attention. Since writing this I've picked up another IB, this time with its name plate, and with a Tessar lens.

IN 1970 Praktica brought out the L series of cameras to replace the

Top speed on the Super TL 2 was 1/500 sec. On the Super TL 1000 it was, naturally, 1/1000 sec.

Nova-based series. They were produced, with various models and modifications, for 15 years so there are plenty of them about. They were far more than a revamp of the Novas with a new body shape, they were a completely new design. Gone was the old horizontally moving cloth blind shutter.
     In its place was a vertically moving metal blade shutter which are generally reckoned to be more reliable and more consistent, and last longer because there are no tapes to stretch or break, and unlike rubberised cloth blinds they never dry out and develop pinholes.
      I’ve got five, an LLC, a TL5, an MTL5, an MTL5B, Super TL 2 and Super TL 1000, which all look very similar, in fact they probably use the same bodies. The other one, which I shall leave till last because it’s rather different, is a VLC.
    The LLC, TL5, MTL5 and MTL5B and Super TL series all have squarish, rather block shaped bodies and were obviously designed to be purely functional rather than win any design awards for consumer styling, but they're quite nice to handle. The shutters are a shade on the noisy side but very smooth.
    Despite the angular looks the L series cameras are very comfortable to hold, and though they're not lightweights I have no difficulty in holding them steady. Provided I’ve got my left elbow or shoulder braced against something I have no trouble going down to 1/15 sec handheld without camera shake. On a couple of occasions when I’ve been caught in a low-light situation with nothing to prop myself against I’ve even used 1/15 sec with no support except both elbows braced

The MTL 5 is representative of most of the L series range.

against my body and still got sharp pictures – well, sharp on a 7x5 inch print. They’d probably show some shake if they were blown up really large
    They’ve all got TTL metering, and here we come to a subject that’s probably given rise to more discussion on internet camera forums than any other single subject – what batteries you can use now that mercury cells are no longer available?     By no stretch of the imagination can I call myself an electrical or electronics buff, though I took the subject many years ago at college. It’s all changed since my day, or at least it seems to be so, but I gather that the L series cameras all have Wheatstone Bridge circuitry for the meter.
   This type of measuring circuit doesn't depend on an accurate voltage, it depends on balance either side of the electric 'bridge' so theoretically they ought not to mind whether the battery, or batteries, used are 1.4 volt mercury cells or 1.5 alkaline or silver oxide cells. Mine seem to work OK with silver oxide and the metering's accurate enough for colour print film which is very forgiving.
    They came with a variety of lenses. In the Uk the standard seems to have been the f/2.8 Domiplan. This was not a poor lens by any standard, and considerably better in my opinion than the f/2.6 Meritar which was offered by some chain stores on discount price models. However, outshining both the Meritar and Domiplan was the f/2.6 Tessar, available as an option. From the number you see about, quite a few buyers took the option up. On many later models you find the f/1.8 Pentacon lens, another excellent performer in my experience.

ELECTRIC sensing of the aperture selected on the lens with electrical contacts on the back of an M42 lens was introduced by Praktica on the LLC in 1969, and the VLC of 1975 was based very closely on the LLC but with a detachable viewfinder released by pushing a catch on the side of the lens housing. Pentaprism and waist level viewfinders were available but waist level finders are not so easly to find. Mine has a pentaprism. Because the finder has a black plastic houding there isn't an accessory shoe on the top so if you want to use flash you have to use a flash bracket fitted to the tripod bush and connected to a co-axial socket on the left hand end of the top plate.

The VLC had a dsetachable pentaprism and a Pancolor lens as standard.

      With electric lenses the metering, with a needle visible in the viewfinder, is at open aperture with a small portion of the view in the centre screen syphoned off to a CdS cell to give a very heavily centre weighted reading. The actual stopping down is by the usual pin on the lens. Non-electric M42 lenses can be used on the VLC provided the depth of the thread is not more than 5.6mm otherwise they may interfere with the mirror and jam the shutter. You can also use the electric lenses on non-electric M42 cameras.
      With non-electric lenses on the VLC you don't get open aperture metering, the metering is at the stopped down aperture given by the first pressure on the release button. When changing between electric and non-electric lenses you have to remember to select open or stopped down metring on the camera by turning a plastic ring under the rewind crank You turn the ring so its indicator dot lines up with one of two circles, a large red dot for open aperture or a smaller red dot for stopped down.
     My VLC came with an f/1.8 Pancolor lens and I've got no arguments with this at all. It gives beautifully crisp pictures with excellent contrast right up to full aperture. The VLC was in production for only about a year and was superseded by the VLC2, but I'm not certain what the modifications on the VLC2 were.
    The VLC wasn'r a particularly cheap camera even with export subsidies by the East German Government to bring in Western currency. Some people saw it as an attempt to make a new 'system' camera, but possibvbly VEB Pentacon felt that the day of the mechanical camera was drawing to close and the VLC looked dated. Instead, the L series was superseded by the B series of cameras, more compact, more modern styling and with fully electronic operation.