>>3280876If you want to remain in the Eastern Bloc and/or go cheap, Praktica MTL5b is as good as it gets and any other Praktica SLR made since then. Uses modern batteries for the light meter, and internally it's well designed with a reliable metal blade shutter, unlike any Soviet/Russian SLR that's just reusing a copied archaic Leica mechanism built to horribly poor factory standards by incompetent labor all the way to the late 90's. The only gripe I have with it is the heavy mirror slap. Soviet lenses can be great, but it's best to use them with actually good non-Soviet bodies.
Pentax Spotmatic and Fujica M42 bodies are also options, although most if not all of them require the old mercury batteries for the light meter. Also they cost way more than the Praktica.
