Soviet designers devised a myriad of different models, some of the brutishly simple, others showing real flair and ingenuity. Thanks to a mix of espionage, war reparations, ingenious design and a desire to show the West a thing or two, the USSR’s camera makers come up with a Soviet answer to almost every camera type made in the West, though not necessarily at the same time. The Soviet Union has its own heavyweights, and between them they have churned out dozens and then hundreds of different camera designs as the decades tick by. What comes after this is first a trickle, and then a flood.įifty years later, and the Soviet camera industry is the second-largest in the world – second only to Japan, whose bands such as Nikon, Canon, Minolta Olympus and Pentax have become household names. It never makes it into production, but Bostelman’s simple snap-shooter is the first Soviet camera. The camera’s back is removable, and removing it turns the rest of the camera into an enlarger which can be used to make prints. Bostelman’s camera is a small 35mm camera with a simple, single-speed shutter and a winding key to advance the film.

It begins in October 1927, with a single camera exhibited in Moscow at an Exposition of Photographic Technique in the new Soviet capital, Moscow.

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