LOMO Lubitel 166B
The Lubitel 166B is part of a popular line of simple, medium format, twin lens cameras produced by the LOMO factory in St. Petersburg, Russia. The camera enjoyed a production run of 900,000 units from about 1980 until 1990.
The Lubitel series was inspired by the Voigtlander Brilliant TLR and it is a rather simple camera. By the time you get to the 166B, the camera's controls are limited to manual setting of shutter and aperture, as well as a manual shutter arming. The previous Lubitel 166 coupled the setting of the shutter with the film advance, but the 166B did away with this feature in order to make the camera mechanically simpler and more reliable. The Lubitel 166B uses a condenser screen in the waist level finder for focusing, meaning that the majority of the viewfinder doesn't change sharpness in response to changes in focus, but rather, a small circle in the middle of the screen must be eyed for critical focusing. The upshot is that the screen is brighter than typical ground glass screens.
The Lubitel cameras in general, and the 166B specifically, have earned a cult following for the qualities of their 75mm f/4.5 Triplet lens. The lens is noted for producing images of high contrast and saturation, even if they are not of the highest sharpness.
Lubitel 166B cameras make a great find for photographers who want to get into medium format photography inexpensively but want something more sophisticated and with more control than a Holga or box camera.
The Lubitel series was resurrected by Lomography in 2008, as the Lubitel 166+ Universal.
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