Developed the film out of the Werra 1

Finally. LOL I had the camera in my bag just so I could finish off the roll, but of course things don't always go to plan.





Adorable little cameras made in East Germany by the original Zeiss Jena works, after the rest of the company moved to Oberkochen.
The WERRA was produced from 1954 as the "Volkskamera" ("Camera of the peopleand continued until 1968, a total of about 560,000 units have been produced.

It has a unique shutter cocking system, with the shutter leaves rotating unlike a conventional shutter design. THese do not reverse direction and hence you get a very high (for the time) shutter speed of 1/750th sec. Of course this also means the shutter machanism is complicated needing a secomd pair of blades for when you cock the shutter again. (The keep the thing light tight.) The shutter speeds are 1sec to 1/750th and Bulb. My two have working shutters although one is stiffer and less reliable than the other.

I have seen that the werra 3-5 have interchangeable-lens i dont have one nor the alternative 35mm or 100 mm lens anyway.

The base plate on my black Werra had me puzzled for a long time. It has these symbols and they don't seem to do anything much. Asking Dailyaviator, websitesarelovely and egeaus about these symbols as it was due to their talk that I bought the camera anyway..
In the middle of the base plate is a large ribbed collar with the tripod socket in its centre.An arrowhead is cast onto it. The base plate has a “C,” an “R,” and a black spot, then "V", "X", "M".
The black spot is “closed” or "lock"; “R” is the rewind clutchand “C” is the open position. BUT what the hell are V, X and M which are on the open side of the "C" Still don't know and I have looked at the user's guide.



The counter is not much help but my black one does seem to be close to the mark. THe green one not so much but just shoot until the shutter doesnt reset. Easy.



Now my two are both werra 1 One (The olive one) only has shutter speeds to 1/250th, has a flat top, the knurled (Alu)silver coloured shutter twist and no markings on the base plate. It has a narrow lens to the other. The covering is like crocodile skin.
The black one has a rounded top, a front plate that has horizontal lines and a lined covering. It has the Prestor RVS shutter and hence has a top shutter speed of 1/250th. Although both are 1s, the black seems much newer than the Olive.

My olive is 1954-55 and my black 1965-68.

(OO thank to this website... the symbols mean V XM (I was asked the question): this is not the name of the model, but setting the flash sync X (e), M (magnesium) and V-timer (Vorlaufwerk in German).

sooooo anyway.. I developed the roll from the black werra.















Well its a great camera ESPECIALLY if you want to learn Hyperfocal distance and shooting with sunny 16. Asyou can see I got the focus right most of the time.
I have a blog post on learning hyperfocal distance in the archives. Its a cute little street camera that no one will come and harrass you about. Highly recomended for lovers of the basic, no fancy tricks cameras.