Kiev-60 TTL

Arsenal · Pentacon Six mount · 6×6cm on 120 roll film; 120 only, where the Kiev-6S also took 220 (pentaconsix.com; Russian Wikipedia) · 1984

via machine translation — corrections welcome

Also known as: Kiev 60 · Kiev-60 · Kiev60 · Kiev 60 TTL · Kiev-60 TTL · Kiev 60TTL · Kiew 60 · Kiew-60 · Киев-60 · Киев 60 · Київ-60 · Arax 60 · Arax-60 · Arax 645 · Arax-645 · Kiev 645 · Kiev-645 · Pentasix

Variants & identification

Variant	Mount	Years	Serial ranges	Production
Kiev-60 TTL (Arsenal)	Pentacon Six	1984	9402996 — 1994, a body sold by fk-secondhand with the 80mm f/2.8 and both finders (first two digits are the year)	—
Arax-60 and Arax-60 MLU (Arax, Kyiv)	Pentacon Six	2002	—	—
Arax-645 (6×4.5 conversion)	Pentacon Six	2002	—	—
Wiese Pentasix (Hamburg)	Pentacon Six	—	—	—

Russian Wikipedia gives the retail price as 690 roubles in 1989 (a list price, not a dealer figure) but cites no period price list or catalogue, so the price field is left empty.
No production figure has been published for the Kiev-60 in the sources consulted.
Weight: 1.95kg with the 80mm lens (camera-wiki), 2kg (Russian Wikipedia, which notes it matches the Kiev-6S), about 1.5kg without a lens (Michael Elliott), 55oz (about 1.56kg) for body and prism and 69oz (about 1.96kg) with the 80mm (Matt Denton). No body-only figure from a primary source, so weight_g is left empty. No dimensions are published.
pentaconsix.com notes that, under command-economy targets, new bodies were built long after 1992 and that hundreds or thousands may survive unsold as 'old new stock': a body in a factory box is not unusual.
Arsenal lenses were sold under the Arsat name from about 1990 (Russian Wikipedia), so a late Kiev-60 kit may carry an MC Arsat 80mm f/2.8 rather than a lens marked Volna-3.
Wiese's PENTASIX 636 is a Kiev-88 with a Pentacon Six mount, not a Kiev-60, and belongs with the Kiev-88 bodies; TRA quotes Braas's Kiev handbook that it matches the Hartblei Kiev 1006 M.

How to tell them apart (expand)

Release on the right front = Kiev-60; release on the left = Kiev-6S or 6S TTL (camera-wiki; Russian Wikipedia)
Strap studs, not lugs, and no 120/220 switch (pentaconsix.com)
Pentacon Six breech-lock mount: lenses lock with a turning ring on the front of the mount; Soviet lenses for it carry the Cyrillic letter Б (Latin B) after the name, e.g. Volna-3Б, Mir-26Б (Russian Wikipedia; pentaconsix.com). Lenses ending in В (Latin V) are for the Kiev-88 and Salyut and do not fit; Western sellers often write that В as 'B' too, so check the mount, not the letter
Serial on the back of the top plate; first two digits = year (camera-wiki)
ARAX, PENTASIX or Wiese markings, black-painted top plates and a mirror pre-release button = an aftermarket rebuild (pentaconsix.com)

Kiev-60 TTL (Arsenal):

Shutter release on the front RIGHT of the body, angled, with a cable-release thread (camera-wiki); the Kiev-6S and 6S TTL have it on the left (pentaconsix.com; Russian Wikipedia)
Two small strap studs on the body instead of the Kiev-6S's strap lugs (pentaconsix.com)
Arsenal logo and serial number on the back of the top plate; the first two digits are the year (camera-wiki)
Cold shoe on an arm fixed to the front of the body; shutter-speed dial on the left of the top plate, lever wind on the right (camera-wiki)
Usually sold with the Volna-3 80mm f/2.8, which is much smaller than the Vega-12 90mm of the Kiev-6S (pentaconsix.com)
Prism: the first TTL prism has an on/off button at the top right seen from the front; the later one has no switch, only a button worked with the forefinger, and cuts out by itself after about 15–20 seconds (pentaconsix.com)

Arax-60 and Arax-60 MLU (Arax, Kyiv):

ARAX nameplate in place of the Kiev one, and the chrome parts painted black (pentaconsix.com)
Flocked camera throat (pentaconsix.com)
MLU version: a small silver mirror pre-release button above the flash socket, and a name bar on the back marking it as the MLU camera (pentaconsix.com)
The later self-switching metering prism (pentaconsix.com)

Arax-645 (6×4.5 conversion):

16 frames per roll rather than 12, with a changed film counter and spacing mechanism (pentaconsix.com)
A resized film gate for frames whose long side is vertical, visible with the back open (pentaconsix.com)
Offered with or without the mirror pre-release button (pentaconsix.com)

Wiese Pentasix (Hamburg):

Small PENTASIX nameplate; no Arsenal logo on the front; WIESE TECHNOPLAN on the back of the top plate (pentaconsix.com)
Top and bottom plates painted black where the Kiev-60 is chrome; film-plane mark filled black (pentaconsix.com)
Chrome mirror pre-release button on the front with a mirror-reset lever beside it; large red dot on the base of the stop-down lever (pentaconsix.com)
Supplied with an 80mm lens that TRA takes to be the Volna optically, in a new barrel; no flash bracket, its hole covered (pentaconsix.com)

Kiev-60 TTL (Arsenal): The factory camera. pentaconsix.com calls it "essentially a modified version of the Kiev 6C"; camera-wiki says that while it is inspired by the Pentacon Six "it has been very substantially re-designed" and that it is not accurate to call it a copy. camera-wiki counts "3 types and 4 subtypes" of the Kiev-60 TTL, citing Komarov, Pikiotas, Suglob/Shaternik/Kochergin and Princelle, without listing them; the only split the sources describe is the two prisms. Unmodified bodies have no mirror lock-up and an unflocked, semi-matte mirror box (Michael Elliott, 35mmc).
Arax-60 and Arax-60 MLU (Arax, Kyiv): Arax, a Kyiv firm, began selling reworked Kiev medium-format bodies around 2002 (pentaconsix.com); Russian Wikipedia describes a private Kyiv company buying cameras from the Arsenal warehouse, testing and adjusting them and selling them under its own name. Arax said it carried out the quality control the factory did not. Mirror pre-release was an option, which TRA found much easier to work than the lock-up on the Pentacon Six and Exakta 66. Still sold new in August 2010 (pentaconsix.com). The body is Arsenal's; the nameplate is Arax's.
Arax-645 (6×4.5 conversion): A more heavily modified Kiev-60: the film gate was resized and the spacing mechanism and counter changed (pentaconsix.com). Russian Wikipedia says Arsenal itself made a "Kiev-645" from the 1990s and that the Kiev-60 and Kiev-645 were made serially until 2005; pentaconsix.com describes the 6×4.5 Kiev-60 only as Arax's conversion. Do not confuse it with the Kiev 645 that pentaconsix.com, after Lothar Braas, describes as a 1991 factory prototype derived from the electronic Kiev-90, which appears never to have entered production.
Wiese Pentasix (Hamburg): Wiese Fototechnik of Hamburg advertised "improved" cameras and lenses under its own name in the 1990s. TRA calls Pentasix a brand rather than a model: it went on both a Kiev-60 and, as the PENTASIX 636, a Kiev-88 converted to the Pentacon Six mount. The Kiev-60 version keeps the original mount and adds flocking to the bottom of the throat and the back of the mirror plate and a bright screen with rangefinder wedges and grid lines. TRA's example came without instructions. The years are not documented.

Specifications

Format: 6×6cm on 120 roll film; 120 only, where the Kiev-6S also took 220 (pentaconsix.com; Russian Wikipedia) · 12 exposures
Finder (eye-level): interchangeable TTL metering pentaprism, uncoupled, CdS; released by two silver knobs on the sides, the left one locking (camera-wiki)
Finder (waist-level): folding hood with magnifier, interchangeable with the prism; no metering (camera-wiki; Russian Wikipedia; Matt Denton)
Shutter: horizontal-travel cloth focal plane, mechanical · 2s (camera-wiki) or 1/2s (Russian Wikipedia; Matt Denton) to 1/1000, B · flash sync X at 1/30 and slower, PC socket; no hot shoe (camera-wiki; Russian Wikipedia) · no self-timer
Film advance: single-stroke lever on the right of the top plate, which also cocks the shutter and lowers the mirror; auto-resetting additive counter (camera-wiki)
Back: hinged, fixed; no interchangeable magazines; opened by a button on the base plate (pentaconsix.com)
Meter: none in the body; the TTL prism meters with a CdS cell. Film speed ISO 9–1000 on camera-wiki and Matt Denton, 16–500 GOST on Russian Wikipedia; battery 4.5V from three LR44/675 cells on camera-wiki (three 675 on Matt Denton), three RC-53 mercury cells or D-0.06 NiCd cells (PX625 today) on Russian Wikipedia
Motor drive: Not compatible
Country: Ukraine (Ukrainian SSR at launch)
Accessories: TTL metering prism (two versions) and waist-level finder with magnifier · Flash bracket fitting a hole in the body, two close-up tubes, collapsible rubber hood, UV and light-green filters, cable release and a large fitted case: the usual kit (pentaconsix.com) · Arax flocking kits for the mirror box (Michael Elliott, 35mmc) · Tripod socket with the old 3/8-inch thread and a 1/4-inch adapter (camera-wiki)

Full-aperture metering of an oval central area, read by two red LEDs: both lit is correct, the right one alone over, the left one alone under. The reading is transferred by hand: set the film speed and aperture on the prism's calculator dials, turn its speed ring until both LEDs light, then set that speed on the body (camera-wiki). The meter works only with the shutter cocked and switches off by itself after 15 seconds (camera-wiki); pentaconsix.com gives about 15–20 seconds and ties the automatic switch-off to the second prism. TRA finds the Arsenal prism brighter than the Pentacon one but notorious for battery use.

Where sources disagree

Last

1992 — Princelle p.225, via pentaconsix.com, which adds that it 'appears to have been made until at least the late 1990s'
1999 — camera-wiki
Still in production in 2003 — Matt Denton, writing that year
2005 — Russian Wikipedia ('выпускались серийно до 2005 г.'), whose infobox says 'to the present'

Left empty. The 1994 body #9402996 rules out 1992 as the last year of production; stock assembled late and sold later blurs the rest.

Speeds

2s to 1/1000, B — camera-wiki
1/2s to 1/1000, B — Russian Wikipedia; Matt Denton

Meter

ISO 9–1000, three LR44/675 cells — camera-wiki; ISO 9–1000, three 675 cells — Matt Denton
16–500 GOST, three RC-53 mercury cells — Russian Wikipedia

Two prisms were made, so both may be right for different ones; no source ties a figure to a prism.

Arax-645

A factory Kiev-645 made serially from the 1990s to 2005 — Russian Wikipedia
An Arax conversion of the Kiev-60 — pentaconsix.com

pentaconsix.com's Kiev 645 of 1991 is a different, Kiev-90-based prototype.

What reviewers say

Michael Elliott, 35mmc (blog) — A bargain way into medium format for anyone happy to tinker: familiar 35mm-style handling, a clear split-image screen and a cheap Pentacon Six lens range. Against it: heavy and loud, no mirror lock-up on an unmodified body, a long advance that must be finished in one stroke, flare from the unflocked mirror box, frames overlapping near the end of the roll and an inconsistent meter. Test with a cheap roll and flock the mirror box.
Matt Denton, Matt's Classic Cameras (blog) — Heavy, with loud mirror slap and the usual Soviet eccentricities, but a surprisingly smooth shutter; a good Volna is a fine lens, if short of the Zeiss ones. His body showed a dark bar at one side of the frame and sometimes missed flash sync; home fixes helped only for a while, and the banding went only after Arax replaced shutter parts and serviced it. Now a studio workhorse, but "a bargain isn't always a bargain".

History

The Kiev-60 TTL is a 6×6 single-lens reflex on 120 film, built by the Arsenal plant in Kyiv from 1984. It takes the Pentacon Six breech-lock mount, the mount of the East German Praktisix, so the Carl Zeiss Jena Biometars, Sonnars and Flektogons fit it, as do the Soviet lenses marked with a Б (Latin B) after the name. It descends from the Kiev-6S of 1971 and the Kiev-6S TTL. pentaconsix.com calls it “essentially a modified version of the Kiev 6C”; camera-wiki prefers “very substantially re-designed” and says it should not be called a copy of the Pentacon Six. In use it is a 35mm SLR scaled up: a horizontal cloth focal-plane shutter to 1/1000, a lever wind on the right, a fixed back, and an interchangeable pentaprism or waist-level hood on top. With the standard Volna-3 80mm f/2.8 it weighs about 2kg.

The 1984 changes were small. The shutter release, which on the Kiev-6S sat on the left and drew complaints according to Russian Wikipedia, moved to the front right. The 220 option went, leaving 12 exposures on 120. Two small studs replaced the strap lugs, and TRA at pentaconsix.com warns that strap clips come off them easily. The standard lens became the Volna-3 80mm, much smaller than the 6S’s Vega-12 90mm. The TTL prism meters through the lens with a CdS cell but is not coupled: set film speed and aperture on its calculator dials, turn the speed ring until both red LEDs light, then set that speed on the body. The first prism has an on/off button at the top right; the second has none and switches itself off. TRA finds the Arsenal prism brighter than Pentacon’s but heavy on batteries. Flash sync is 1/30 at a PC socket; the cold shoe is on a bracket. The mirror does not return until the shutter is cocked, and an unmodified body has no mirror lock-up.

How long it was made is unclear. Princelle, cited by pentaconsix.com, ends it in 1992, but TRA adds that it was made “until at least the late 1990s”, and a body numbered 9402996, a 1994 camera by its serial, has been offered by a German dealer. camera-wiki ends it in 1999, Matt Denton wrote in 2003 that it was still in production, and Russian Wikipedia says it was made serially until 2005. TRA also notes that production targets left large stocks of new bodies, so a boxed, unused camera is not rare. Russian Wikipedia gives the 1989 retail price as 690 roubles. Lenses from about 1990 carry the Arsat name rather than Volna or Mir.

The Kiev-60 was the base for several rebuilds. From about 2002 the Kyiv firm Arax sold the Arax-60: an Arsenal body with an ARAX nameplate, the chrome painted black, a flocked throat and, as an option, a mirror pre-release button above the flash socket. Its Arax-645 has a new gate and counter for 16 vertical 6×4.5 frames per roll. Russian Wikipedia describes a factory Kiev-645, a name that also belongs to an unrelated 1991 prototype derived from the Kiev-90. In the 1990s Wiese Fototechnik of Hamburg sold a Kiev-60 as the Pentasix, with a small PENTASIX plate, WIESE TECHNOPLAN on the back of the top plate, black top and bottom plates, flocking, and a mirror pre-release with a reset lever. Wiese’s Pentasix 636 is a converted Kiev-88 and a different camera.

To identify one, look at the release: right hand means a Kiev-60, left hand a Kiev-6S. The serial is on the back of the top plate, and its first two digits are the year. Check the lens letter as well. A Б lens fits, while a В (Latin V) lens is for the Kiev-88 and Salyut and does not, even though many sellers write both as “B”. When buying, expect the faults Michael Elliott found. The advance is long and heavy and must be finished in one stroke, or the shutter will not cock. Frames tend to overlap near the end of a roll. The unflocked mirror box flares when shooting into the light, and the meter reads inconsistently. His advice is to shoot a cheap test roll first and look for a workaround before paying for a service. Matt Denton likewise advises a slow, single advance stroke and found the frame spacing irregular on a camera that had sat unused. His body showed a dark bar at one side of the frame and sometimes missed flash sync, and only new shutter parts and a service from Arax cured it. Run the shutter at every speed, check that the strap studs are secure, and fit fresh cells to test the prism.

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This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Photographs

Kiev-60 TTL — Rama, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0 fr)

Live listings

Kiev-60 TTL Medium Format 6x6 SLR w/ 80mm f2.8 Lens [EXC+] — $645.00 · Victory Camera · likely Kiev-60-TTL

Listings updated 2026-11-09. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.