This is the FED3 with SuperiaXTRA 400.
This is the Ihagee Exa with Portra 400.
Crappy Commie Camera Party: Brothers From Another Motherland
For the Crappy Commie Camera Party, I present for your consideration “Brothers From Another Motherland. I shot these with my two little 35mm comrades: the 1952 Ihagee Exa and the 196? FED3. The Exa hails from Dresden, East Germany while the FED3 from Russia. The Exa belonged to my wife’s grandfather and I’ve shot with it before. It’s a fantastic and fun little camera. I bought the FED3 off eBay from some random guy in Ukraine specifically for the #CCCP. It had some shutter damage which I successfully repaired. Other than that, it was in fine working order (well, infinity focus could use a recalibration, but that’s hardly that big of a deal). The FED3 was the big surprise here. The Industar 61 lens is shockingly sharp. I had an absolute blast shooting with it. The Exa is a little awkward to use at times due to the small waist-level viewfinder, but you get used to it.
I put a roll of Kodak Portra 400 in the Exa, a roll of Fuji SuperiaXTRA 400 in the FED3, and hit the streets of St. Petersburg. Florida, not Russia. But sort of Russia. We have a store downtown called Vladimir’s Collection, owned b a Russian guy named Vlad (who would have guessed). He sells Russian art and assorted Russian things. While out shooting, I popped in, chatted him up in Russian (ok, with a few Russian words that my wife taught me), and he let me snap a few shots in the store. He recognized the FED3 before I had it out of the case. He’s a swell guy. The store’s lighting was not ideal for shooting in, but they came out ok. The rest of the shots are from being out and about in St. Pete. I took some of the same shots with both cameras to compare, in case you are wondering or have even read this far. If you have read this far, congratulations. You get a gold star. Now, on to the pictures.
Enjoy.
