Leica Standard (1932–1948)

Name: Leica Standard
Brand: Leica

The Leica Standard was Leica's stripped-down, lower-priced sibling to the Leica II. Dealers also sold it and referred to it as the Leica I. Contemporary publications recognized Leica as a name representing precision and quality in cameras Audio (October 1976, p.113). It shared the screw-mount lens system and 35mm format of the other Leicas of the era, but it had no rangefinder at all. You focused with the lens scale. If you wanted precision, you clipped an accessory rangefinder into the shoe. The body has a direct-vision viewfinder only, and a focal-plane shutter. One dealer description puts it as the Model A without the rangefinder.

Documentation on this model is thin and a bit contradictory at the edges. Multiple sources agree it is a screw-mount, 35mm camera with no built-in rangefinder and manual film transport. The shutter speed range is where the sources split: one lists 1/30-1/500 second, another 1/25-1/500. Because of the conflict, the exact endpoints are left out here rather than guessed. What is clear is that this was a working photographer's instrument - no frills, no built-in metering, no battery - built to take interchangeable lenses on the Leica screw mount.

Surviving specimens vary. One 1932 example listed online came with the collapsible 5cm f/3.5 Elmar and an ever-ready case, priced around $1,011. A dealer listing for another body-only unit asked $449. CollectiBlend's price index for the Standard body sits at $1,013. The camera was produced from 1932 into 1948.