Iskra-2
It's often difficult to find inspiration. For nearly all of the Soviet Union's camera production years, it was far easier to make clones of cameras from the West than it was to develop new cameras. Whether it's the FED cameras looking like Leica cameras or the Kiev 88s resembling Hasselblads, it's not difficult to see where the post-World War II camera makers from the Soviet Union found their "inspiration". By the late 1950s, the engineers at the Kransogorsky Mekanichesky Zavod (Kransogorsk Mechanical Factory) - or KMZ - located outside of Moscow were looking for a replacement for the folding 6x9cm camera called the Moskva. Their inspiration came from the Agfa Super Isolette cameras and took the name Iskra.
The first Iskra cameras were released in the Soviet Union in 1960. Named after the first communist newspaper, Iskra means "spark" in Russian. These were very simple folding cameras that make 6cm square images on 120 roll film. In 1961, a slightly updated version called the Iskra 2 was released. Its primary upgrade was the addition of a selenium-based light meter, which gave the photographer an EV scale reading. This number could then be transferred to the coupled aperture and shutter speed dial. The coupled mechanism allowed for accurate exposures across a range of shutter speeds and apertures.
Each model of the Iskra uses a four element, coated Industar-58 lens with a 75mm focal length and a maximum aperture of f/3.5. The Industar lens itself is a nearly direct copy of the Zeiss Tessar lens, but with a spottier record for build quality, the Industar lenses are more prone to individual uniqueness. Whether this is a feature or a bug is up to the user to decide.
Despite its ease of use and compact size, the Iskra cameras were not produced in large numbers. In total, between 1960 and 1964, fewer than 45,000 Iskra cameras came out of the KMZ plant. The limited production is not necessarily reflected in the price, however, and these cameras can be found for very reasonable prices. As with many cameras of this vintage, however, it's a good idea to keep expectations fairly low, and also to be ready for good surprises.
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