Praktica LLC with Pancolar 1,8/50 lens, the first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with electrical diaphragm simulation between interchangeable lenses and camera body (1969)
Praktica was a brand of camera manufactured by Pentacon in Dresden in eastern Germany, within the GDR between 1949 and the German reunification in 1990. The firm Pentacon was divided in mainly two parts and sold after German reunification. Schneider Kreuznach and Noble bought parts of it. Pentacon is a Dresden-based company in the optical and precision engineering industry, which was at times a major manufacturer of photo cameras. The name Pentacon is derived on the one hand from the Contax brand of the Dresden Zeiss Ikon Kamerawerke and Pentagon (Greek for pentagon), because a pentaprism for SLR cameras developed for the first time in Dresden has this shape in cross section. Today's PENTACON GmbH Foto- und Feinwerktechnik is still based in Dresden. It is part of the Schneider Group, Bad Kreuznach. Pentacon is the modern-day successor to Dresden camera firms such as Zeiss Ikon; for many years Dresden was the world's largest producer of cameras. Previous brands of the predecessor firms included Praktica, Exa, Pentacon, Zeiss Ikon, Contax (now owned by the Carl Zeiss company), Ica, Ernemann, Exakta, Praktiflex, and many more.
Among the innovative legacies of the predecessor firms are the roll film SLR camera in 1933, the 35mm SLR in 1936, and the pentaprism SLR in 1949. After WWII the company's products were best known in the Eastern Bloc countries, though some were exported to the west. They currently produce both budget lenses (mostly small, not very durable, and having manual focus, but good in optical quality) and higher priced products [citation needed]. They also produce optical equipment for the space programs of the US, Western Europe and Russia. [citation needed]
In 2001, the production of Praktica Analogue SLR cameras was discontinued with the focus shifting to a range of Praktica digital compact cameras and camcorders together with an extensive range of binoculars, spotting scopes, accessories and other optical imaging products. Praktica today produces many products under various brands such as auto industry products, 3D LCD screens, and still cameras and lenses under their own Praktica brand and also more known international brands. Since September 2015 the owner of the Praktica brand has been Praktica Ltd, a UK limited company.
Praktica EE2 SLR from 1977Pentacon Praktica VLC2 with Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 20/2.8 mountedPraktica BC1 from the early 1980sPraktica B100 electronic
1887 Richard Hüttig founded the first camera manufacturing company in Dresden.
1896 Zeus-mirror reflex camera with plate magazine as first single-lens reflex camera from Dresden by the company Richard Hüttig & Sohn.
1897-98 Foundation of the Aktiengesellschaft für Camera-Fabrikation Heinrich Ernemann in Dresden; Foundation of the Aktiengesellschaft für photographische Industrie Emil Wünsche in Dresden.
1903 Bosco mirror camera for 9×9 roll films by the Wünsche AG.
1903 The Ernemann-Kino movie camera uses 17.5mm One-hole filmstrips for taking and displaying movies. The word Kino (cinema) had been born.
1906 Hüttig-AG becomes the biggest camera manufacturer in Europe with more than 800 employees.
1912 Foundation of the Industrie- und Handelsgesellschaft m.b. H., named Ihagee Kamerawerk GmbH since 1914.
1919 Foundation of the camera shop of Benno Thorsch and Paul Guthe.
1923 Inauguration of the 48m high tower building of the Ernemann AG (see photography on the Pentacon GmbH page).
1924 The high-speed Ernostar lens designed by Ludwig Bertele of Ernemann AG, was first made in f/2, then in f/1.8 maximum aperture. Its unprecedented speed made available-light photography possible for the first time. While it was supplied to a number of other cameras, it was best known on Ernemann's own Er-Nox (later called Ermanox) cameras.
1926 With the help of the Carl Zeiss Stiftung, four German camera manufacturers - Contessa-Nettel (Stuttgart), Ernemann and ICA (both Dresden), and C.P. Goerz (Berlin) were merged to form Zeiss-Ikon AG, and became the largest camera manufacturer in Europe with 3400 employees.
1933 EXAKTA 4×6.5, a small roll-film single-lens reflex camera using 127 film, was introduced by Ihagee Kamerawerk Steenbergen & Co.
1935 Contaflex: first 35mm twin-lens reflex camera with interchangeable lens and the first camera with built-in exposure meter was introduced by Zeiss-Ikon AG.
1936 Kine Exakta: first 35mm single-lens reflex camera introduced by Ihagee Kamerawerk Steenbergen & Co.
1939 Praktiflex introduced by K.W. AG, Dresden-Niedersedlitz
1945 Heavy destruction of the 'Dresdner Kamerabetriebe' (Camera Manufacturing of Dresden) through aerial bombing on February, 13th-14th 1945
1949 Contax S: first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with built-in pentaprism viewfinder (world novelty), offering an unreversed viewfinder image, introduced by MECHANIK Zeiss Ikon VEB, at that time a 'state-owned' company. It also introduced the M42 screw lens mount for interchangeable lenses.
1949 Praktica single-lens reflex camera with M42 lens mount
1950 EXAKTA Varex by Ihagee Kamerawerk AG is the first single-lens reflex camera with interchangeable view-finders
Praktica BCA from the late 1980sSample picture made by Praktica camcorder DVC 10.1 HDMI in LW resolution.
1956 Praktica FX2 by VEB Kamera-Werke Dresden-Niedersedlitz is the first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with diaphragm stop-down actuation mechanism built inside the lens mount
1959 Merger of the 'Dresdner Kamerabetriebe' (Camera Manufacturing of Dresden) to 'VEB Kamera- und Kinowerke Dresden' (VEB Pentacon Dresden since 1964).
1965 Praktica mat by VEB Pentacon Dresden is the first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with TTL exposure measurement in Europe.
1969 Praktica LLC is the first 35mm single-lens reflex camera with electrical diaphragm simulation between interchangeable lenses and camera body by the VEB Pentacon (Dresden).
Praktica MTL 50 with Pentacon 50 mm f/1.8Praktica LLC with Helios44M 58 mm f 2
The MTL series was successful and is not mentioned. So is the electronic SLRs of the B series.
A single-lens reflex camera (SLR) is a camera that typically uses a mirror and prism system that permits the photographer to view through the lens and see exactly what will be captured. With twin lens reflex and rangefinder cameras, the viewed image could be significantly different from the final image. When the shutter button is pressed on most SLRs, the mirror flips out of the light path, allowing light to pass through to the light receptor and the image to be captured.
The Exakta was a camera produced by the Ihagee Kamerawerk in Dresden, Germany, founded as the Industrie und Handels-Gesellschaft mbH, in 1912. The inspiration and design of both the VP Exakta and the Kine Exakta are the work of the Ihagee engineer Karl Nüchterlein, who did not survive the Second World War.
Carl Zeiss AG, branded as ZEISS, is a German manufacturer of optical systems and optoelectronics, founded in Jena, Germany in 1846 by optician Carl Zeiss. Together with Ernst Abbe and Otto Schott he laid the foundation for today's multi-national company. The current company emerged from a reunification of Carl Zeiss companies in East and West Germany with a consolidation phase in the 1990s. ZEISS is active in four business segments with approximately equal revenue in almost 50 countries, has 30 production sites and around 25 development sites worldwide.
A pentaprism is a five-sided reflecting prism used to deviate a beam of light by a constant 90°, even if the entry beam is not at 90° to the prism. The beam reflects inside the prism twice, allowing the transmission of an image through a right angle without inverting it as an ordinary right-angle prism or mirror would.
Kiev is a Soviet and Ukrainian brand of photographic equipment including cameras manufactured by the Arsenal Factory in Kiev, Ukraine. The camera nameplates show the name "KIEV", with older cameras using "КИЕВ" or "КИЇВ" in Cyrillic.
Contax began as a German camera model in the Zeiss Ikon line in 1932, and later became a brand name. The early cameras were among the finest in the world, typically featuring high quality Zeiss interchangeable lenses. The final products under the Contax name were a line of 35 mm, medium format, and digital cameras engineered and manufactured by Japanese multinational Kyocera, and featuring modern Zeiss optics. In 2005, Kyocera announced that it would no longer produce Contax cameras. The rights to the brand are currently part of Carl Zeiss AG, but no Contax cameras are currently in production, and the brand is considered dormant.
Ihagee was a camera manufacturer based in Dresden, Germany. Its best-known product was the Exakta single-lens reflex camera.
The M42 lens mount is a screw thread mounting standard for attaching lenses to 35 mm cameras, primarily single-lens reflex models. It is more accurately known as the M42 × 1 mm standard, which means that it is a metric screw thread of 42 mm diameter and 1 mm thread pitch.
The history of the single-lens reflex camera (SLR) begins with the use of a reflex mirror in a camera obscura described in 1676, but it took a long time for the design to succeed for photographic cameras. The first patent was granted in 1861, and the first cameras were produced in 1884, but while elegantly simple in concept, they were very complex in practice. One by one these complexities were overcome as optical and mechanical technology advanced, and in the 1960s the SLR camera became the preferred design for many high-end camera formats.
The Zeiss Sonnar is a photographic lens originally designed by Dr. Ludwig Bertele in 1929 and patented by Zeiss Ikon. It was notable for its relatively light weight, simple design and fast aperture.
Pentacon is the company name of a camera manufacturer in Dresden, Germany.
The Contaflex series is a family of 35mm Single-lens reflex cameras (SLR) equipped with a leaf shutter, produced by Zeiss Ikon in the 1950s and 1960s. The name was first used by Zeiss Ikon in 1935 for a 35mm Twin-lens reflex camera, the Contaflex TLR; for the earlier TLR, the -flex suffix referred to the integral reflex mirror for the viewfinder. The first SLR models, the Contaflex I and II have fixed lenses, while the later models have interchangeable lenses; eventually the Contaflexes became a camera system with a wide variety of accessories.
The Pentacon Six is a single-lens reflex (SLR) medium format camera system made by East German manufacturer Pentacon from 1966 to 1992. The Six accepts lenses with the Pentacon Six mount, a breech-lock bayonet mount.
The "Sport" camera is the series production model of a prototype camera called Gelveta. The Gelveta was designed and built by A. O. Gelgar between 1934 and 1935. It is the earliest known production 35mm SLR camera ever to be built, but fewer than 320 examples were made. The actual launch date of the "Sport" is somewhat uncertain, however it was in series production by 1936 and must undoubtedly be one of the two earliest generally available SLR cameras using the 35mm film format, the other being the German Ihagee Kine Exakta, launched in 1936. It was manufactured by the Soviet camera factory Gosudarstvennyi Optiko-Mekhanicheskii Zavod, The State Optical-Mechanical Factory in Leningrad. GOMZ for short. The camera name is engraved in Cyrillic on the finder housing above the lens: „Спорm“. The manufacturer's prism logo in gold on black with the factory initials ГОМЗ (GOMZ) is shown behind a circular magnifying window on the top left camera front. An estimated number of 19,000 cameras were made before Leningrad was besieged in September 1941 and suffered heavy damage. The design concept was not continued later.
The Topcon RE Super, or Beseler Topcon Super D in USA, was launched by Tokyo Kogaku KK in 1963 and manufactured until 1971, at which point it was upgraded to the Super D and again to Super DM the following year. General sale continued for several years. These later models have a shutter release lock lever on the shutter release collar. It is a professional oriented 35mm SLR camera that had a comprehensive range of accessories available. It has a removable pentaprism viewfinder and focusing screen. It features the Exakta bayonet lens mount for interchangeable lenses. A special accessory shoe is situated at the base of the rewind knob with a standard PC sync. contact next to it. The release button is placed at the right-hand camera front, but there is no mirror-up facility; this was included on the upgraded versions. The standard lens is the RE. Auto-Topcor 1:1.4 f=5.8cm or the slightly slower 1:1.8 version. A battery-operated winder could be attached to the camera base.
The 35mm SLR camera Alpa-Reflex has its origins back in the 1930s when a Swiss precision mechanical manufacturer decided to diversify their product range, having mainly relied on manufacturing parts for the watch industry. They sought outside assistance and by 1939 the plans were ready and building cameras commenced at a very slow rate. The camera was eventually named the Alpa because it was light, pocketable, and might easily be brought along travelling in the Alps. The Alpa-Reflex is only predated by the Kine Exakta, the Sport, and the Praktiflex 35mm SLRs. The manufacturer was Pignons S.A, Ballaigues, and the designer was Jacques Bolsky born December 31, 1895, in Kiev as Yakob Bogopolsky. He emigrated to the United States of America once the design was completed. He was also the inventor of the renowned Bolsey and Bolex cine cameras.
Contarex is a line of 35mm single lens reflex cameras (SLRs) made by Zeiss Ikon. It was first presented at Photokina in 1958 and initially scheduled for delivery in the spring of 1959, but it was not made generally available in the United States until March 1960. The first model is popularly known as the Contarex I, the Bullseye, or the Cyclops, after the prominent light meter window above the lens, in front of the pentaprism. The camera was aimed at the high-end and professional markets; in 1961, the retail price was $499.
Kamera-Werkstätten Guthe & Thorsch (K.W.) was established 1919 in Dresden by Paul Guthe and Benno Thorsch, starting out manufacturing the Patent Etui plate camera. Ten years later came the roll film TLR Pilot Reflex and in 1936, the 6×6 SLR Pilot range. By that time, Benno Thorsch, the surviving partner from 1919, decided to immigrate to the United States and arranged with the US citizen Charles Noble to swap enterprises. Noble came to Germany and moved the factory to Niedersedlitz on the outskirts of Dresden, while Benno Thorsch in Detroit ran the acquired photo finishing business that was one of the largest in the USA. The new Kamera-Werkstätten AG, Niedersedlitz prospered, and in 1939 launched the 35mm SLR Praktiflex camera. The concept proved successful, and through continuous development, the Praktica name became one of the most popular 35mm SLR brands for several decades, beginning in the 1950s.
Kamera-Werkstätten Guthe & Thorsch was a photographic equipment manufacturer based in Dresden.
August Nagel was a German camera manufacturer and designer. He was among the founders of Zeiss-Ikon and later left to form Nagel Werke, which he subsequently sold to Eastman Kodak. His most notable legacy is the Kodak 135 film cartridge which remains the world standard for 35mm still-cameras.
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