Smena 8

10

The Smena 8 is a plastic bodied 35mm viewfinder camera made by Lomo. and can also go by the name of Cosmic 35 and Cmeha 8.

I came across Smena camera when i was browsing Ebay looking to buy a Smena 8m (not to confuse them both) , i instantly loved the look of it and googled to find out more about it, because the ebay listing was useless.

It was made by the Lomo company in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), and launched in 1963 and was produced till 1971 and was one of a series of Smena’s up to 9. The further version of the Smena 8 was the predictably named the Smena 9, which just had the self-timer deleted (it was basically the Smena 7 with film rewind knob added). So the Smena to buy for me was obvious.

So after getting the camera, I fed her some film and went out to experiment….. but when i went to pick up my film from my local lab they said that they didn’t print them because all of the negatives were blank :(

So not impressed by the camera i left it on the shelf to gather dust for a year or so.

But it wasn’t till the other day i did feel a bit sorry for it so i loaded her up with some
Lomo x-pro and taped the back up loads, mumbling ‘not this time you don’t’
and i was right the film was a success, the colors are really vibrant and the pictures are crisp so now that know abit more about the practical use of the camera I’m going to feed her some black & white film next,

So if anyone is thinking about buying this camera or have one already and had bad results from it i would strongly advise taping the back up just in case :)

I hope this helps you in enjoying the Smena yourself! Check out the microsite here

written by spendospend on 2009-04-07 #gear #review #lomo-russian-smena8-cosmic35-35mm

10 Comments

  1. stouf
    stouf ·

    Some great doubles !

  2. 3lla
    3lla ·

    The colours are fantastic! I'll definitely be saving up for a Smena :)

  3. spendospend
    spendospend ·

    this review was for the smena 8 not the smena 8m as pictured above, such a nice camera though, its a new fave :)

  4. rater
    rater ·

    Number 6 has something weird with the green light... I do not even know what it is that green thing! And good thing you gave a second chance to the camera!!

  5. plesaleza
    plesaleza ·

    the rewind knob doesn't work on mine... but i'll give it another shot

  6. spendospend
    spendospend ·

    u need to push down the shutter button and turn it clockwise till the 2 little red dots meet, then u can rewind :)

  7. sancast
    sancast ·

    It's a great camera. I have one and love it.

    But It's a little bit complicated to use. Soviets didn't know to much about design and practicality. :)

    And you HAVE to tape the back. In my lab you can check some of my Smena 8 photos and see the light leaks of a non-taped back (actually, they are kind interesting).

    Regards from Brazil!

  8. amaan
    amaan ·

    hey. great article
    i recently got a smena 1M and 4 photo's were ok. rest were blank.
    what do you mean by taping?

  9. blacktape
    blacktape ·

    Untill now, getting and using a Smena 8 has been a disaster, found and bought one on a auction site.. once i received it and loaded my first roll..the winding knob just broke off.

    So i had to find another one and use it as a donor for parts...couple of fleamarkets later i found one!

    Repaired/fixed it..loaded it but then got confused about rewinding the film..so i tried rewinding and unloading my film...it ruined my roll, ripped in pieces...put the Smena8 back on the shelf.

    So thanks spendospend for explaining how to rewind the film, i am definitely going to load it tonight and shoot some images...will tape the back :-D

  10. narkalen
    narkalen ·

    Can you post some pictures with the taped back? Thanks for the review!

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