Arsenal

the Kiev rangefinder cameras

After World War II, much of the tooling at the Zeiss factory was appropriated by the Soviets and installed in the Ukraine, at a defense factory in Kiev known as Arsenal. Arsenal is best known for having cloned some notable cameras, including models by Hasselblad, Zeiss Ikon, Nikon and Pentacon. Most of them were not copied directly, but were instead simplified for production behind the Iron Curtain. Some, such as the Contax clones, were quite good. Arsenal also created one of the most original of all cameras: the Kiev 10. Of all Soviet camera manufacturers, Arsenal also has the largest cult following, given their product complement of cheap yet usable medium format equipment.

The Arsenal factory produced all Kiev (cyrillic: Киев) cameras. The most well-known camera produced at Arsenal is the Kiev 88 (derived from the original Salyut), which shares origins with the original Hasselblad 1000 and 1600. Who borrowed whose design is the subject of endless debate, which you can read about in a number of places.

The Arsenal factory also made Mir and Arsat lenses, which were good Zeiss copies. Their ubiquitous quality-control problems notwithstanding, the Ukrainian lenses are quite good, and some of them are outstanding. The company still produces cameras and lenses.

35mm

Rangefinder

• Kiev II (2)
• Kiev 2a
• Kiev III (3)
• Kiev 3a

• Kiev 4
• Kiev 4a
• Kiev 4am
• Kiev 4m
• Kiev 5

SLR

• Kiev 10
• Kiev 15
• Kiev 15 TTL
• Kiev 17
• Kiev 17 M
• Kiev 18
• Kiev 19
• Kiev 19M
• Kiev 20

Fixed Lens

• Kiev 35
• Kiev 35A
• Kiev Exxell Automatic

Medium Format

SLR

• Kiev 6C

• Kiev 60
• Kiev 80
• Kiev 88
• Kiev 90
• Salyut
• Salyut S (C)

16mm Subminiature

• Kiev-30
• Kiev 30 M

• Kiev 303
• Kiev Vega
• Kiev Vega 2

Links

• Arsenal company homepage
• ARAX company upgrades and sell worlwide the Arsenal production
• Arsenal Cameras at USSRPhoto.com
• Wikipedia's Arsenal company history
• Rick Denney's Kiev camera page
• David Haardt's Kiev 88CM page seems to have an Arsat bias
• Alfred Klomp's page of Soviet logos
• Kiev medium format help page with simple lens tests but also with usable information for other formats.
• Kiev pages at Antique Russian Camera
• 35mm Kiev rangefinders at Communist Cameras
• Arsenal page at Collection G. Even's site
• web site of the Kievaholic Klub
• Cameras and User manuals at www.collection-appareils.fr
• Russian camera instruction manuals including Fed, Kiev, Zenit and Lubitel
• KIEV section at Retrography.com by Simon Simonsen, Denmark
• 35mm SLRs on Photohistory.ru illustrates many Kiev SLRs