Soviet Factory Logos

Most items of photographic equipment from the Soviet Union are marked with the logo of the factory where they were made.

Soviet Union best quality logo

Soviet Union best quality logo

It is suppossed to indicate that the item which stamped with this logo is equal of any other similar item world wide.

Factories

Arsenal logo on Kiev-4M image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

Arsenal

Zavod Arsenal (Завод Арсенал = Arsenal Factory), Kiev, Ukraine. Arsenal is one of the oldest and most famous industrial factories in Soviet Union and later Ukraine. The factory mainly specialized in optical components for the Soviet military and space programs. The factory also produced the professional grade photographic cameras. They were Kiev 135 film and 120 film series, Salyut series, and some others.

BelOMO logo

BelOMO

BelOMO (Belorussian Optical and Mechanical Association) formed in 1971 by the merger of MMZ and the Vilejka Factory, and apparently Peleng. BelOMO continued to produce cameras and lenses, cine cameras, accessories, projectors, etc. The plants may continue to use their original logos on the products produced in each plant of the association.

FED logo original

FED

FED logo on FED-1 image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

F.E. Dzerzhinsky Factory, Kharkov, Ukraine. FED is the initials of F. E. Dzerzhinsky, the founder of the NKVD, in honor of him the factory was named. The NKVD was the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (= Народный комиссариат внутренних дел = Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del, (НКВД = NKVD), a secret police organization of the Soviet Union later known as the KGB. The factory was originally an orphanage workforce was based on youths living and working together in a commune. After the groundbreaking introduction of the Leica II in 1932, Soviet leaders stopped the import of photographic equipment and set the FED factory to its task of creating a Leica of their own. Only 18 months later, in 1934, the FED factory began churning out its first clone of the Leica II rangefinder camera. Since then, they have produced millions of cameras, some good and some not so good. The variations in the engravings on the FED camera tops make it worth a special mention, reflecting the changes within the Soviet Union.

GOMZ

GOMZ logo on Lubitel-2; VOOMP logo and very early GOMZ logo on Fotokor-1.Images by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

KMZ logo early

KMZ logo (1993-Present)

KMZ

KMZ logo on Zorki-1 image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

Krasnogorsky Mekhanichesky Zavod KMZ (Красногорский механический завод = Mechanical Factory of Krasnogorsk), near Moscow. KMZ is known largely for its cameras like Iskra, Kristall, Mir, Moskva , Start, Zenith (early series), Zorki series and some others. Some of these were produced several millions. It also has a large military optics and mechanical engineering division.

Kazan logo

Kazan KOMZ

Kazan Optical and Mechanical Plant (КOMЗ) first started to operate on 1940. During the Second World War KOMZ produced a wide range of optics instruments like binoculars, photographic objectives, photo controlling devices, marine range finders, dive-bombers scopes. Camera lenses was Industar-22, Industar-27, Industar-50, Industar-51, Industar-37, Jupiter 11, Jupiter 37 and Fodis 1K.

LOMO

LOMO logo

LZOS

LZOS logo on Yellow filter on Kristall image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

Lytkarino Optical Glass Factory (= Лыткаринский завод Оптического Стекла ЛЗОС), in Lytkarino, 100 km north of Moscow. It was a KMZ satellitссадасд

MMZ

MMZ logo

Plant 69 logo (early NPZ)

NPZ logo modern

Rostov logo

Minsk Mechanical Factory named by S.I. Vavilov (Minskiy Mechanichesckiy Zavod imeni S.I. Vavilova). Founded in 1957, MMZ was located in Minsk, Belarus, approximately 450 miles SW of Moscow. Initial production was optical glass and the Smena-2 camera. In 1971, MMZ became BelOMO.

NPZ

Novosibirsk Instrument Factory, Novosibirsk (=Новосибирский приборостроительный завод Нпз = Novosibirskiy priborostroitel'niy zavod NPZ). The former name of the plant was Plant of Precision Mechanics, Krasnogorsk and later Plant 69. After the WW2 this plant was known as NPZ. The plant was evacuated in 1941 from Krasnogorsk to Novosibirsk. The plant made various military products, and at least one camera, Vostok. The logo is still used by NPZ, now specialized in telescope making. NPZ factory modern business emblem has a slightly altered ratio than early plant 69 logo.

Rostov ROMZ

Rostov produced viewfinders.

Valdai

Valdai logo on Helios lens of Zenith ET image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

Optical-Mechanical Factory Valdai is located about 400km north-west of Moscow. Very little is known of this plant, but it has been a prolific producer of lenses for KMZ, and Zenit. The SLR lenses were Helios name.

File:Leningrad Electronic Factory “Vibrator”.jpg

Vibrator

Vibrator

Vibrator (Leningrad Electronic Factory “Vibrator”)

Vilejka

Vilejka logo on Zenith ET image by Süleyman Demir (Image rights)

Vilejka Factory, or officially OM RUP "ZENIT". In Soviet times it was known as Vileiskiy Zavod Zenit. Founded in early 1970 in Vilejka, near Minsk, as a Zenit camera manufacturing factory for MMZ and KMZ. The Vilejka Zenits were apparently intended primarily for home use, and earned a poor reputation for quality. Vilejka, has produced the following Zenit models: E, 12SD, TTL, ET, 11, 15, under slightly different designations. Vilejka is apparently still producing Zenits, i.e. Zenit 130.

Vologda logo

Vologda logo late

Vologda

Vologda produced Mir-1B, Jupiter 21, Helios 44 and 77 lenses.

VOOMP

In 1929 the Council of Labour and Defence of the USSR decided to join all optical and mechanical factories of the era under the same name, "Union Trust opto-mechanical enterprises" (VTOMP), (= Всесоюзный Трест Оптико-Механических предприятий ВТОМП). In 1930 VTOMP name changed as the Union of Optico-Mechanical Companies (VOOMP), (=Всесоюзное объединение оптико-механической промышленности, ВООМП). Under this name a small number of cameras and lenses were produced in the pre-war years, like folder Fotokor-1, VOOMP II Pioneer (one of the first Leica II copies made in the Soviet Union). In the transition times, VOOMP and very early GOMZ logos are seen together on the Fotokor-1 cameras. In 1932 the company was renamed again as "State Optical Mechanical Plant (GOMZ).

ZOMZ logo early

ZOMZ logo late

ZOMZ

Zagorsk Optical and Mechanical Plant (ZOMZ=ЗОМЗ), Zagorsk in Russia founded in 1935. Factory manufactures of a wide spectrum of the optical mechanical and optical electronic devices. Lenses that Zagorsk produced are Jupiter 3, Orion 15, Mir 1, Mir 1b and Tair 3A.

Zenit 12SD

Links

• in Communist Cameras by Nathan Dayton
• Logos of Soviet factories at Alfred's Camera Page
• The Dzerzhinsky Commune by Oscar Fricke
• Soviet and Russian Cameras by Aidas Pikiotas
• KMZ in Wikipedia
• LOMO in Wikipedia
• LZOS Company
• KOMZ Company
• ZOMZ Company
• NPZ Company
• Jupiter 12 in Matt Denton's website
• In Russian: Logos of Soviet factories at Zenit Camera
• In Russian: VOOMP in Novacon
• In Russian: LOMO in ru-wikipedia