Ihagee

The Exakta's birthplace — Dresden precision since 1912

Ihagee is the company that invented the 35mm SLR and, in doing so, changed photography forever. While the Exakta name became the more famous brand, it was Ihagee Kamerawerk in Dresden that designed, engineered, and manufactured these revolutionary cameras. Understanding Ihagee means understanding the Exa series: stripped-down, affordable SLRs that brought through-the-lens viewing to the masses.

History

Industrie und Handels AG, abbreviated to Ihagee, was founded in 1912 by Johan Steenbergen, a Dutch entrepreneur who recognized Dresden's extraordinary concentration of optical and mechanical talent. Steenbergen established his company among the city's legendary camera makers, drawing on the skilled workforce that had made Saxony the center of European precision manufacturing. Ihagee initially produced plate cameras and tropical cameras designed for colonial use, but Steenbergen's ambitions extended far beyond conventional designs.

The company's world-changing moment came in 1933 with the introduction of the first Exakta, a roll-film SLR, followed in 1936 by the Kine Exakta, the first 35mm SLR camera. This invention launched an entirely new category of photography and established Ihagee as one of the most innovative camera manufacturers on earth. The Exakta brand became synonymous with professional-quality SLR photography, and Ihagee continued to develop the system through the Varex and VX series with interchangeable viewfinders, a feature that would influence every professional SLR that followed.

But Ihagee's contribution to photography extends beyond the flagship Exakta line. In the 1950s, the company introduced the Exa, a simplified, more affordable version of the Exakta designed to bring SLR photography to a wider audience. The Exa stripped away the interchangeable viewfinder and some of the Exakta's more exotic features, producing a compact, lightweight SLR that was genuinely accessible to amateur photographers. The Exa series evolved through numerous variants over the following decades, becoming one of the most widely produced SLR families in East Germany.

Following nationalization under the East German state, Ihagee became VEB Ihagee and continued production as part of the broader Dresden camera industry. The company was eventually absorbed into VEB Pentacon in the 1960s, and the Ihagee name ceased to appear on cameras. But the engineering legacy persists in every SLR ever made. The mirror box, the pentaprism viewfinder, the bayonet lens mount for interchangeable optics: all of these concepts were pioneered or perfected by Ihagee's engineers in their Dresden workshops.

Notable Cameras

Exa I

The Exa I is the camera that democratized the SLR. While the Exakta was a professional tool with a professional price tag, the Exa made through-the-lens viewing available to students, hobbyists, and anyone who wanted to see exactly what their lens saw without paying a premium. The Exa I uses a unique blade shutter that doubles as the mirror mechanism, keeping costs down while maintaining the essential SLR experience. It is small, light, and surprisingly pleasant to use, with a waist-level finder that produces a bright, engaging image on its ground glass. Pair it with a Carl Zeiss Jena Tessar 50mm f/2.8 and you have an extraordinarily capable system for the price of a nice lunch.

Exa 500

The Exa 500 updated the original design with a top shutter speed of 1/500 second and improved construction, making it a more versatile tool for outdoor photography. The Exa 500 sits in a sweet spot between the simplicity of the original Exa and the complexity of the full Exakta, offering enough capability for serious work without the weight or cost penalty. East German photography students were practically raised on these cameras, and many went on to produce remarkable work with nothing more than an Exa 500 and a standard lens.

Exa 1a / 1b / 1c

The later Exa variants, including the 1a, 1b, and 1c, represent the final evolution of Ihagee's budget SLR concept. These cameras incorporated incremental improvements in metering, viewfinder design, and ergonomics while maintaining the essential Exa character: affordable, reliable, and perfectly matched to the excellent Carl Zeiss Jena lens catalog. They are wonderful cameras for anyone learning film photography, offering all the fundamentals of SLR operation in a package that forgives mistakes and rewards attention. The Exa series proves that a great camera does not need to be expensive; it just needs to get out of the way and let you take pictures.

All Models in Archive (9)

Slr

• Exa - 1951-1962
• Exa 1a - 1964-1977
• Exa 1b - 1977-1985
• Exa 1c - 1985–1987
• Exa 500 - 1966–1969
• Exa I - 1963-1964
• Exa II - 1960-1963
• Exa IIa - 1963-1964
• Exa IIb - 1964-1966