If you are the owner of a vintage lens or camera that was made in a country of the ex Soviet Union then it is very possible that you noticed a logo or some other marks. Usually those logos give us information about the factory that the product was made. The fact that you own a Helios lens, a Zenit or Zorki camera does not mean that they were made in the same factory. So to discover the factory that your vintage Soviet lens was made you must search for such marks and know their meaning. Could a factory logo means that a lens or a camera was produced with higher quality standards? According to some people, yes. A mark does not always tell us the factory of production though. It maybe a quality mark. For example, the State quality mark of the USSR. Or a letter sign that give us information about the glass or if the lens is radioactive. For example, L means lanthanum. In some other cases a mark can give us information about lens coatings (single or multi-coated etc). Keep in mind that this article can't cover everything so i will update it whenever possible. Feel free also to send me things that you think that i did not mention. Lets now see some Soviet factory logos and their meaning.
KMZ (Russian:КМЗ - Красногорский механический завод - Krasnogorskiy Mechanicheskiy Zavod . In English it is known as Krasnogorsk Mechanical Works.
KMZ was one of the biggest optics manufacturing factories of the Soviet Union.It is located near Moscow Russia in the city of Krasnogorsk. It was set up in 1942 and was producing military gear such as scopes, binoculars and reconnaissance cameras. With the end of World War 2, Russians as part of war reparations largely carted off the equipment of the Carl Zeiss factory in Jena in Thuringia Germany. After that they started producing cameras and photographic lenses to the specifications of the Carl Zeiss corporation. Their first consumer camera came out in 1945 and it was the Zorki. Some people call it the Russian Leica cause it is considered to be a copy of Leica II. The big step forward was probably made in 1953 when they produced the first Zenit (SLR camera) that was a great success. Millions of other lenses and cameras were made such as Iskra, Mir, Moskva, Quarz, Start, Kristall and even F-21, a camera for the KGB. KMZ won in 1958 the World Exhibition prize in Brussels. For many people KMZ produced higher quality products and more expensive gear that other Soviet factories. It is still active today as a state corporation, part of Shvabe Holding group producing optical products. The factory stopped producing cameras in 2005 but later the Zenit M mirroless camera was introduced and some manual lenses like the Zenitar 35mm.
FED (cyrillic ФЭД ) or FED Machine Works
Until the 1920's there was an orphanage in Kharkiv Ukraine. Remember when i mentioned that KMZ produced special cameras for the KGB? Guess what! That orphanage was renamed to FED to honor the founder of NKVD, F.E Drezinski. So the name FED is nothing else than the initials of that person. NKVD (cyrillik НКВД ) was the secret police of the Soviet Union and the forerunner to the KGB. FED was actually a machine - building plant but it became famous mostly for its cameras. In 1932 Soviets decided to stop importing cameras and create their own. After 2 years the FED 1 was introduced. It is supposed to be an exact clone of LEICA II. The same year the factory was put under NKVD control. The production stopped in 1941 because Germans destroyed the factory but in 1946 the production started again. Since then million of cameras and lenses came out of that factory. Another interesting fact is that the factory logo had many variations. Some of the famous FED products are rangefinder cameras like the FED 1 or FEDKA and its successors. Some great lenses were also produced. For example, the Industar 26 and 61, the Jupiter 8, 9 and 12, the Orion and the Russar lenses. It seems that the production of cameras stopped around 1994 and after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The factory still exists but they are specialized in the development, production and repair of aerospace and general engineering units mostly in Ukraine.
ZOMZ (Russian: ZOM3 - Загорский оптико-механический завод) or Zagorsk Optical-Mechanical Plant
Zomz logo - Mir 1 37mm B (V)
ZOMZ was founded in 1935 in Sergiey Posad, Russia. In the West it is known for the lenses that it produced: Jupiter 3, Mir 1 and Mir 1B (V), Tair 3A and Orion 15. Today it belongs to the same holding group with KMZ. ZOMZ designs and produces optical based products such as sport optics, rifle scopes, night vision devices, binoculars etc for military and civilian use.
VALDAI or JOV (Jupiter Optics Valdai) or Optical and Mechanical Plant Jupiter, Valdai
A Helios 44M lens in bad shape with the Valdai logo
I could not find a lot of information about this factory. It seems that it was a KMZ satellite plant. A version of Helios 44-2 was manufactured there and later the production line was move to KMZ. But it seems that this information is probably wrong because i own a Helios 44M with the Valdai logo. It seems that Valdai versions produced lenses only with M42x1 / 45,5 threads. The last Helios lens that was produced from this plant was probably a multi-coated version of Helios 44m-7.
BelOMO ( Belorusskoe Optiko-Mechanichesckoye Obyedinenie) or Belorussian Optical and Mechanical Association
It was founded in Minsk in1971 in Byelorussian SSR (Belarus) after the merge of MMZ, Vilejka factory and Peleng. They produced cameras, projectors, lenses and even cine cameras. MMZ produced the Smena 2 camera. Vilejka or Vileiskiy Zavod Zenit produced Zenit cameras. Probably their last model that they produced was the SLR Zenit 130 with the Helios 44m-5 lens in 1999. Peleng seems that it was a satellite plant for MMZ and today for Belomo. I was able to find a BelOMO MS Pelens lens. Each plant is able to use their original logos. The BelOMO plant still exists today and you can even find their online store on Amazon. One of the products i was able to find in their website is the BelOMO EWP Fisheye lens MS 3.5/8A.
LOMO (Cyrilik ЛОМО orЛенинградское Oптико-Mеханическое Oбъединение - Leningradskoye Optiko-Mekhanicheskoye Obyedinenie ) English: Leningrad Optical Mechanical Association
In 1914 a French - Russian company was founded in Petrograd, Russia. The city now is called St. Petesburg. That factory was producing cameras and lenses and gun sights but 5 years later it was nationalized. In 1921 the factory was named G.O.Z (Factory of State Optics) and later it was renamed again as GOMZ (State Optical-Mechanical Plant). They produced the Lubitel camera. In 1966 it was renamed again as LOMO. In 1975 LOMO created the BTA-6 that was the worlds largest telescope. The also created cameras such as Smena, Sokol 2, Sputnik and Voskhod. In 1991 two students bought a LOMO Kompact Automat camera (LC-A) and they were impressed with its capabilities. They founded the Lomographic Society and the Lomography movement was born. They released an improved version of the same camera and called it LC-A+. But the camera was manufactured in China and only the lenses of some models were made by LOMO. The LOMO as a company still exists but they do not manufacture cameras.
State quality mark of the USSR (Russian: Государственный знак качества CCCP - Gosudarstvennyi znak kachestva SSSR )
Although you may find this mark in your photographic equipment it was used for several other products. It was an official certification of quality from the Soviet state. It was established in 1967.
Letters : P (Π) means that a lens has enlightened optics. The letter L (Λ) inform us that the glass has Lanthanum.
There are photographers that claim that some factories had better quality controls than others. For example, that KMZ had better quality standards than Valdai but i am not sure that such claims are true. Those factories produced million of cameras and lenses and it is probably a matter of luck to buy a good copy. My opinion is that if you find a trustworthy seller you will get a good working lens or camera. There will be probably minor differences but at the end the items will be usable.
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