Another New Member

Hi All,

I want to introduce myself to everyone. My name is Steve Berkowitz and I have been collecting photographic equipment for 30+ years. I own quite an assorted collection including Russian/FSU Cameras, Art Deco Photographic Equipment, and American Classic Cameras. I am the President Of the Chicago Photographic Collectors Society which was founded in 1971.

I see that fellow Collector, Bill Parkinson, is a member...Hi, Bill !!
I also see that Vlad is a neighbor. I live in Highland Park....Hi, Vlad !!

I have plans to photograph my collection, so stay tuned. As you all know, it's a piece of work.

I look forward to contributing and learning from this group.

Regards,
Steve

Steve!

Welcome! Wow, we are like 15 minutes away from each other! I'm in Buffalo Grove! :) Great to have someone local! I heard about Chicago Photographic Society but thought that I would not fit in there will all my Russki stuff! :).. Now I have to look into joining it! Can you provide any more details of what that entails?

Thanks,

Vlad.

Hi Steve,

Welcome to the site and forum. Good to see you here. I know you have a great collection of cameras of all types and a very, very fine collection of Russian cameras.

It will be good to hear from you more often (and sorry I haven't written in a while), and maybe see some of your cameras on this site where they can be added to the WIKI section very easily, as I have found out.

Regards, Bill

Vlad, you and your Russian camera equipment would be welcomed to our group. There are a number of our members that own FSU gear and like to speak about it. You can check out our website at www.chicagophotographic.org/

We meet the third Tuesday of the month, January through November, at the Ridgeview Restaurant in Wilmette. It's at the intersection of Ridge & Lake. As a matter of fact tomorrow is the August Meeting. The Program will be on Family Photo's over 50 years old.
You are always welcomed to sit in at any time. I would love to meet you and introduce you to our group. The meeting starts at 7pm.

Bill, yes, it has been a while since we last emailed. A whole lot of family life and home construction. I do look forward to sharing more with you. I don't know if I told you of my acquisition of a Ukrainian Kiev or not. I also lost a chance to acquire a Reporter. The Seller contacted me through the Society, had a few shots of the camera and his terms. I agreed and never heard from him again. Strange!! Oh well.

I did buy a new book from CameraBooks.com. It's the hard copy of Claudio Asquini's "From Russia With A Click". It's a wonderful volume for those with an interest in the history of the Kiev, and Fed 1 Camera's. He also includes a number of other models such as the Sport, TVVS, Leningrad, etc. For quite a while this info was available on disk only but he finally got it in printed form. A great addition to my library.

Steve

Hi Steve,

Too bad you didn't get that Reporter! It is a beautiful camera and hard to find, but you'll get one sometime!

Yes, I'm familiar with Claudio and Albino's "From Russia with a Click!" but I only have a CD that I bought from them and I didn't know they had it into a book as well. I'm going on vacation for about 10 days but I'll get in touch with them when I get back. Claudio was the first Russian camera collector that I met when I started collecting, because I had bought a VOOMP and I found his web site about that camera. I asked him if would look at photos of my camera and he was very happy and helpful about authenticating my camera!

It will be great to see photos of your collection.

Regards, Bill

Steve,

thanks for an invitation I will see how my schedule is, I have a new baby, so sometimes it's hard to get out of the house at night... but I will give it a try. It would be great to meet fellow collectors, I may even bring some of my uncommon cameras if I make it.

Regarding reporter there is still one for sale at Soviet Camera store in Ukraine, the link is in the resources section. I've bought a few cameras from there it's a reliable seller.

Thanks,

Vlad.

Steve
And all members.
Thanks for the good references on the book of Claudio Asquini Albino Pegorari. This is an edition of Novacon (ourselves). I invite all people of the group to contact us in all intended matter you want to print concerning Russian stuff.
Salute you all.