Voigtlander Vito II – A Review and Samples

75 Years old folding camera with lot to offer;

Voigtländer vito ii is post war bellow type folding camera with a Voigtländer Color-Skopar 1:3.5/50mm lens for 135 film. First introduced in 1949 and came in few variations such as Prontor S or Compur Rapid shutters, cold shoe mount, X & XM sync and 8 or 10 shutter speeds.

Photo: Voigtlander Vito II Prontor S without cold shoe. © Champaka M Wijerathne

Review

It was a hot summer weekend in Copenhagen which usually mean lots of flea markets which are filled with antique stuff. I was going past one of my regular flea markets and suddenly saw a small black pocket camera at one of the stalls with a logo on it which fairly resembled the legendary Voigtlander logo. I immediately move through the crowd and picked it up, and it was a Voigtlander Vito II .

Camera was in fairly decent condition but the shutter was stuck and the camera could not completely collapsed. And one of the plastic tabs which covers the closing tabs was missing. In voigtlander vito II, you need to have a film loaded to shutter to be working, so I opened the back and manually rotated the film advance roller and no luck. It seemed to be the both shutter and the bellow closing mechanism was stuck together. I asked the guy how much and he said 50kr (7.50$) and I brought it.

A soon as I got home, I had a careful inspection and was hoping for a several hours of tedious CLA to get the shutter released. After few minutes of fiddling around I found out that one of the bellow closing mechanism’s lever was out of orientation and camera was actually in closed position even though it is fully opened. I flipped it other way around and voila; the heavenly sound of the leaf shutter. After a little lubrication the camera was working perfectly as clockwork. All the shutter speeds, apertures, film advancing and the counter was working precisely. Bellows was free of light leaks. So I loaded it up with a “god knows when” expired Fomapan 400 and got going.

The camera it self is a Joy to shoot with. It is brilliantly made and actually live up to the name of pocket camera. It is a real pocket camera, tiny in size when folded which you can put in your trouser pockets and forget about it. Weight around 400g by the way. It is bit thicker than a modern smartphone but I went cross country mountain biking with the vito ii in my pocket without any worries in the world. And oh boy it is a pretty. It is a beautifully crafted machinery which you can stare at all day. I finished a roll of fomapan 400 in a week and by next Saturday, I was ready to develop. Even though I shot it faster, actually the time it took to take one picture was significantly higher. I tend to go more and more towards much “slower” camera and slower overall process more and more. And it seems the vito II is at its balance point for me. Even in a busy street from the moment you take the camera out to the moment you click the shutter, it takes enough time to to set the composition, exposure and focusing, so you will be fully emerged in the moment. By the time you’re going to click the shutter your vibe and the mindset will be complete different, you will probably re compose the photograph in parley with a much pleasing aesthetic. And click the shutter, fold, put in pocket and move on with the chaos.

Loading Film into Vito II

Loading film in to Voigtländer vito II is pretty straightforward. It only takes 135 roll films and you load it like any other camera and manually set the counter to start position by turning the tiny wheel hidden behind the small latch on the back. Vito II user manual have a comprehensive description about loading film into the camera.

Loading the camera with film.

Loading and changing film should best be done in the shade – your body will cope with the first exposures. to prevent fogging

1. Open the camera back by lifting the locking edge on left.
2. For regular 35mm film, you can skip this step. If it tis old 35mm film without metal casing, The empty take-up spool must be in the right side chamber, if this is not the case, it can be changed from left to right by pulling up the rewind and the film advance knobs on the top. To ensure that the film advance knob engages the take-up spool correctly, the button can be turned to and from, after having pushed the little lever behind the film advance knob upwards.
3. The left spool chamber will accept the new film cartridge. To insert film cartridge pull up the Rewind knob completely and push the projecting center of the cartridge in to the slit of take-up spool . Now push Rewind knob back into its original position by turning eventually slightly either way to let the ax engage the film cartridge properly.
4. Pull the beginning of the film across counting shaft 20 and film aperture, insert it into the wide slot of the take-up spool and engage it there. Give Advance knob one full turn to ensure that the beginning of the film winds itself tightly on to the take-up spool. When Advance knob stops turning, push the little lever upwards and release it again. Check that the sprockets of the counting shaft engage in the film perforations and that they take it with them. The film must run exactly along the slide way
5. Close camera back and let locking ledge engage by applying some pressure with your thumb.

Setting the film counter.

If the film advance knob is not yet locked after having inserted the film it must be given a turn to right as far as it will go before setting the film counter. When this position is reached, Push the little lever upwards and hold it fast the thus freed wheel (which is visible now) is turned in the direction of the arrow until the index in the film counter window comes to be exactly opposite “F” – let the little lever fall back.

Now give Advance knob a turn to the right until it stops, then push blocking little lever upwards and release it. Give Advance knob another turn until a stop. The film counter is now showing No. 1. The film is ready for the first exposure.

If the written manual does not make any sense for you, Here is a POV video of film loading.

Download Voigtlander Vito II Manual

Optics

Voigtlander Vito II comes with a Voigtländer Color-Skopar 50mm f 3.5 lens and my particular copy came with the Prontor S leaf shutter with 8 speeds maxing out at 300. Color-Skopar 50mm is specially made for color photography and the optical quality is excellent. It has really good sharpness across the frame and has surprising micro contrast. Resolution power of the lens is also pretty good and there are almost none major optical errors. It seems to have character or It just me overwhelmed. Either way I couldn’t be more happier for the photos it generates despite its age and size. There are no light meter or split screen focusing. Camera is fully manual and you have to do zone focusing or manually measuring. Lens has a spot on distance scale with markings for zone focusing.
Double exposure is possible with double exposure interlock lever.

Sample Photos

Photos were shot on the Voigtlander Vito II on Fomapan 400. Developed with Roidinal 1+25 dilution at 20°C for 5.30mins.

© Champaka M Wijerathne