KMZ Narciss camera

Preamble

Several lifetimes ago, I worked in the industrial cutting tools industry, and as in other trades, tales were passed down from generation to generation. One such legend was that the Americans were invited to a machine tool exhibition in Russia, so they sent a steel rod as thick as a human hair. Once the show ended, the Russians sent it back with a hole drilled through it. The American upped the ante and reciprocated with a thread in the hole. It could go on and on, but the idea is clear: a race for industrial superiority.

However, much as I appreciate the US industry, miniaturization is not their strongest suit.  In the motor trade, for example, they never made a true small car. They made cars smaller than the 60s land yachts,  but the result was awkward, poor and unpopular. See the Pinto and the Nova, K-cars and Gremlins, among many others. The Falcon and Valiant, considered compact, were sold as large family saloons in export markets. On the other hand, the world made mini cars: the Germans had the Prince and the Beetle; the Italians had the Fiat 500 and Vespa 400; the French had the 2-CV and Renault 4; the Brits had the Mini and Anglia; the Czechs had the Octavia and Felicia; and I am yet to mention the Japanese.

If my memory serves me right, the first time true small cars were offered under an American brand was in 2002, when GM took over Daewoo and rebranded the cars as Chevrolet.

Back to the camera trade. The American had an extensive photographic industry until imports killed it. Cameras came in all sizes; yet the smallest were not truly small, let alone tiny; they were just smaller. The Kodak Bantam Special comes to mind, but as a one-off design exercise rather than a trailblazer.

The camera on my bench is a hands-down victory for the Soviet postwar camera industry over the US. The Narciss is a true tiny camera, yet able and fully fledged, not a toy.

Made by KMZ, of Krasnogorsk, on the outskirts of Moscow, which came to sad fame with the terrorist attack on a convention hall in 2024, killing 151 and injuring 600 others. The company was established in mid-war as a supplier of military optics and added civilian hardware after the German defeat, when the Russians moved the Zeiss Jena and Dresden plants there, complete with machinery, blueprints, materials, and human knowledge. Winner-takes-all. From there, it progressed to making millions of cameras, initially based on pre-war models.

As a side note, another Soviet camera factory, FED, named after Felix Dzerzhinsky, based in Kharkiv, Ukraine, similarly began making cameras off the ashes of a fully transferred ex-Leitz factory, making the famous FED Leica clone. Mr. Dzerzhinsky headed the Cheka, the forerunner of the infamous KGB, and was one of the very few Soviet top security officials who died of natural causes.

The FED camera line is said to be the brainchild of a commune manager who ran a shop that made shovels and hoes. I guess naming an organization after Felix E. Dzerzhinsky was a foolproof way to keep one’s head attached to one’s shoulders. I don’t know what a Soviet ’commune’ means; from what I read, it was a labour camp for young delinquents. Considering that, evolving from making shovels to Leicas could be a tall order, taking more than good intentions and a powerful patron. So, FED had seconded early production to KMZ, with the early KMZ models named FED-Zorki, later Zorki alone.

As with other Russian cameras, the early models, copies of a successful camera and made under German supervision, were well made, but their quality, features, and design declined with each generation until nothing of the original glory remained but the name.  See the Zorki 1 to 11 line.

KMZ was best known for the Zenit, Moskva, Zorki and Horizont lines, with some models made in the millions.  It made several other insignificant models in short runs, and ceased making cameras in the early 2000s. It still makes military and scientific optical equipment.

As such, the Narciss is an exception to the KMZ legacy. It is of KMZ’s own design, engineering and quality, which was typical of GOMZ/LOMO rather than KMZ. No offence meant.

The format

Mini SLR brings to mind the Olympus Pen F and FT, the Minolta 110 Zoom and 110 Zoom Mark II and the Pentax Auto 110 and Auto 110 Super. The Narciss predates all other Mini SLR models, and looks as current as if designed today. The Pen F/FT sold at about 500,000, and the Pentax Auto 110/Auto 110 Super sold just under 1,200,000. Against this, the meagre sales number of the Narciss, 10,939, proves that it was made at the wrong time and in the wrong country.

It is written that the camera was first designed as a scientific/medical apparatus; if so, it could well be that it missed its original calling and afterwards popularity because of the film format. As a scientific camera, the format was too small for quality images. A common full-size body using 35mm could do a better job. Creative optics could capture an image without an SLR’s complexity, with an even smaller body, while still using a 35mm format. Using a mini-frame format is a means, not an objective. Nonetheless, the timing was bad: the #126 cartridge was introduced in 1963, and this format could have fit perfectly in the Narciss’ body at a much friendlier 26x26mm frame size.  That said, the SLR models that used #126 cartridges, such as the Kodak Instamatic Reflex, Ricoh 126 C Flex, or Rollei SL26, were poorly received. Using an Instamatic cartridge on an SLR kind of defeats the purpose. An SLR is meant for an advanced photographer, so the simplicity of just dropping in a cartridge was redundant.  Add to that the #126 iffy film path resulted in an uneven film plane, with all imperfections magnified; any shooter worth his salt will run back to the good old pressure plate. That is not to dismiss the #126 and #110 formats, which sold tens of millions of cameras made on four continents. Other micro formats were available at the time. The Narciss 14×21 mm frame didn’t match any of the popular sizes; the closest I can think of is the Rollei 12x17mm. I don’t think the Russians would have lost sleep over using an off-licensed, West-patented format, but it could hinder export sales. To sum it up, using bulk-loaded, unperforated 16mm media could well have been a stumbling block for sales.

This saga suggests the Russians found an elegant solution to a problem that didn’t exist to begin with.

The miniature proprietary cartridges took cut media. This size could be slit from a 35mm bulk roll by either a factory-supplied slitter or a self-tinkered matchbox with two razor blades, as shown at fotoussr.ru, a page easily translated by Google. The cartridge took about 90 cm / 3’ of roll, good for 24 exposures of 14×21 frames. A similar off-beat format was used with the F-21 KGB camera, as unperforated, 21 mm wide. Not sure why they didn’t use the perforated 16 mm format, which was widely available and doesn’t scream ‘The Russians are coming!’

The camera

The Narciss name fits very well. In Roman mythology, Narcissus was the hunky love child of a minor deity and a nymph, who fell in love with his own reflection in a pond. This camera well justifies this name; it is easy to fall in love with. It is well made and finished, nicely designed and easy to handle, as is its younger relative, the Pen F.  It is smaller than the Pen and larger than the Pentax; see images below. By design, it doesn’t have the pentaprism hump, as it was dropped deep into the body rather than mounted as a superstructure.

The camera was supplied as a kit, having an extra blank cartridge, a leather case, a development tank adapter, and an enlarger adapter. An optional lens adapter to 39mm LTM and a microscope adapter were also available.

A slew of interchangeable lenses were in the works, but only a precious few reached the market. fotoussr.ru has good information about the Narciss’ accessories, lenses, and a (Russian) user manual.

The camera came in only one model, with minor cosmetic variations. Early models had fair, cream-coloured skin, later changing to black skin with a chrome top. See sovietcams.com for the variants.

As was common with Soviet cameras, the first two digits of the serial number denote the production year.

The camera is simple to use; all settings are where you expect them to be, no mystery levers. It looks natural, like a puppy compact SLR of the era. All dials and levers are proportionally sized; it looks like a Barbie camera.

• On the top:
  • On one side are the winder lever that also cocks the shutter, a half-moon self-reset frame counter, the trigger, and a Leica-style shutter speed dial.
  • In the middle is the viewer pentaprism, which slides back easily.
  • On the other side are two sync ports, X and M, and a rewind knob with a film-speed memo embedded in it.
  • All are tiny but easy to manipulate.
  • A magnifying waist viewer was in the plans but was not commercially offered.
  • Note that you should change the shutter speed after the shutter is cocked.
• The viewer is at the back, proportionally tiny, and on the dim side. There is no split image or focusing ring, but the whole image gets fuzzy when out of focus.
• The back opens via a folding thumb latch, marked only ‘closed,’ and has no mark indicating where to position it. It locks when the ‘closed’ is in the middle, and the latch falls toward the groove next to it. On my camera, the back is difficult to remove and remount, so if it doesn’t move by force, it takes more force.
• At the bottom are the said latch and a rewind release pinhead.
• Inside is a nicely finished film path, flanked by a feeder and a take-off bays. A machined film track and a baby-sized focal-plane horizontal cloth shutter sit in the middle. A pressure plate is mounted on the back cover.
• The lens assembly is removable, mounted on a 23mm thread, which did not fit any other convention. An adapter for a 39mm thread was offered. A slew of lenses were in the plans, but they were not widely available; the actual number of lenses made is unavailable.
• The lens settings are easy to maneuver, well marked and self-explanatory.
• The lens on my desk is a Beta M-1, 2.8/35, whereas earlier models feature the Industar 60, 2.8/35.

For collectors or experimental shooters, this is a must. Relatively few were made, and they don’t come cheap. It is a unique model, and compared to other KMZ models, it is made to high specifications. I don’t know whether a given exemplar is functional, so expect to pay a premium for a working one. Highly recommended.

Camera passport