You Oughta Be in Pictures …

Posted on February 13, 2020 by Robert

LIFE ad for Fairchild Cinephonic 8mm movie camera c1961

Toronto. … as Rudy Vallee sang in the 1934 song of the same name. Just about a quarter decade later, Fairchild promoted its Cinephonic 8mm sound movie camera by advertising a Warner Brothers screen test for Hollywood talent!

The ad touted, “Get your friends or family to help you make your Cinephonic ‘screen test.’ They’ll have as much fun filming it as you have acting in it.”

It was totally unlikely any 8mm movie camera of the era could even compete with the 35mm professional cameras of the day, but it was great fun to promote the Cinephonic and Warner’s stars like Connie Stevens, Sharon Hugueny, Diane McBain and Troy Donahue in the latest Warner Bros film called Parrish.

My thanks to George Dunbar once again for alerting me about this May 5, 1961 ad in LIFE (p19)  for the short lived Fairchild Cinephonic camera. I did a post last month on  the earlier turret model. This model uses an early zoom lens – an expensive lens for an expensive camera).

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KISS Photography

Posted on February 12, 2020 by Robert

Simplicity of the Polaroid

Toronto. Photography in the terms of cameras followed the Keep it Simple, Stupid (KISS) philosophy for decades from the very beginning.  A box in a box served to adjust focus before bellows and threaded tubes came along. A ground glass served as a focussing screen   – no need for special view finders. A hat or lens cap served as a shutter for many decades. No stops or waterhouse stops were used long before the complex aperture mechanisms arrived.

To take advantage of this history of simplicity, Polaroid compared the simplicity of using their sophisticated camera to using a simple box camera. No mention of the expensive film or one-off prints the cameras made; just simplicity and results in 10 seconds!

A tip of the hat to PHSC member George Dunbar for  this lovely old May 12, 1961 advertisement from LIFE magazine (pp106-7).

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Photographic Canadiana 45-4 issued

Posted on February 11, 2020 by Robert

Carter and Lansdale at Gateway Postal Station with boxes of the latest journal.

Toronto. Don’t look now, but the latest issue of your favourite photo magazine hit the distribution network last Tuesday afternoon (February 4th). David Bridge and I joined editor Bob Lansdale Monday morning (3rd) to package this issue. David brought along rubber fingers to help speed up the process.

A new Xerox printer used last issue acts like a large two-sided colour laser copy machine spitting out the sorted and stapled issues ready to be trimmed for packing and mailing. This issue should be in member mail boxes already, or in a few days. 45-4 contains Toronto Notes for June, September, October, and November plus a photo essay on December’s Show and Tell (a favourite annual event).

This is followed by part one of an abbreviation of the award winning thesis by Ms Hana Keluznik on the colour photos in Britain of Ms Agnes Warburg (including a couple of pages in colour). Next is a book review on the “What’s Who” book; three Graflex treasures; and an explanation of the 1930s complex colour method called, “The Vivex Colour Process“.

Not a member? You should be! Just look to the upper right and choose the destination and 1 or 3 years, then pay via PayPal. No account needed – just your credit card!

 

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PHSC Consignment Auction March 31, 2020

Posted on February 10, 2020 by Robert

PHSC Consignment Auction

Toronto. We’re having an auction! A special auction! Everyone Welcome! The lots are being grabbed up fast! We may have room for you at the door, BUT send your photos to auction@phsc.ca and your items will be vetted and valid items sent on to me for inclusion in a web slide show here.

Our auction will be held at the same location as before. Click the poster at the upper left for details or click here. Never been to our previous auctions in Long Branch (South West Toronto)? Then click here and scroll down for a map.

Admission and parking both free!

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’cause cheap is how I feel

Posted on February 9, 2020 by Robert

Keystone K-20 8mm camera

Toronto. If you were living in the Eastern States in 1961, you could buy a  Webcor Regent Coronet stereo tape recorder and get a free movie camera. The camera was the low cost Keystone twenty model with a single f/2.3 fixed focus lens – basically a box camera for 8mm.

The tape recorder was a reel to reel audio recorder which came with two microphones. Such machines were very popular at the time. In the late 1950s, my friend Terry and I took his massive Ampro reel to reel tape recorder backstage at the Rymark (on Peel) in Montreal and recorded a session by Bo Diddly when he was a rising name in music.

Keystone made many cameras over the years. The company was established in Boston in 1919 and survived until 1968 when it was sold to Berkey Photo and moved to Clifton NJ. as  part of Berkey’s camera division. I bought my dad a Keystone 8mm camera in the late 1950s that looked like this model except it had a turret. The Twenty was likely Keystone’s entry level model as higher priced cameras sported turrets and faster lenses in those days before reasonably priced zoom lenses.

Thanks once again to my good friend George Dunbar for spotting this historic advertisement in the March 17, 1961 issue of LIFE magazine. NB. the title of this post  is from the Cowboy Junkies’s haunting “‘cause cheap is how I feel” tune sung by Margo Timmins on their “the caution horses” CD. The group is Canadian, started in Montreal and later moved to Toronto.

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re-creating the war that started Canada

Posted on February 8, 2020 by Robert

George Dunbar’s photographic find in LIFE

Toronto. Canada was formed in 1867 in a well known conference held on spud island (PEI). The founding of the Dominion was Britain’s reaction to the US Civil War and its means to protect the British colonies in North America from the Bellicose Americans.

Those of us steeped in photographic history realize the civil war promoted the tintype and wet-plate photographer Matthew Brady’s ill-fated venture in making war prints to be sold in galleries as mementoes. The main drawback to the scheme was the glacial slow speed of cameras and wet-plate media. Brady could not take any action scenes, only dead soldiers, stiff portraits and scenery.

Brady’s efforts are now a solid basis for the civil war histories and a source for re-enactments such as this one discovered by fellow PHSC member George Dunbar on pp86-7 in the March 17, 1961 issue of LIFE magazine. The essay reminded me of a 1954 song “Old Folks” by the Sauter Finegan orchestra, which I have on LP and CD.

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hello darkness, my old friend

Posted on February 7, 2020 by Robert

scene setting HDR B&W at ISO 400.

Toronto. Art and Paul may well have sung about night photography sixty years ago with their Sounds of Silence song in 1964. Mid last century film ASA was very slow – in fact a rating of 200 or so was considered a fast film!

Photos like this night shot, post-snow storm a few years ago (February, 2013) were impossible to take a century or so ago. Films and lenses were too slow; optical stability technology didn’t exist; HDR was for darkrooms and tripods only.

I took this shot with a Sony NEX-6 using a B&W setting, built-in HDR, and ISO 400. Taken at f/4, 1/2 second shutter speed (and I used a tripod – getting too unsteady as I age).

 

 

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Swiss knives and cameras

Posted on February 6, 2020 by Robert

small Swiss Army Knife

Toronto. When the minicam bug took off in the mid 1930s, people traded size for resolution. Companies like Leitz touted the use of enlargers to make large images from the small negatives. And minicams proliferated. The cameras ranged from complex mechanisms with many built-in features like the Compass camera to very utilitarian cameras like the Leica.

Both concepts had many added features. One built-in, and the other with a wide variety of accessories. The Exakta was more middle of the road – not as feature rich as a big Swiss Army Knife but far more features than a utilitarian design like the early Leicas. Being an SLR, an Exakta viewer worked just fine with any lens focal length. Long exposure times were built-in as was a film knife – just think of a smaller version of a Swiss Knife as shown – scissors, nail file, small screw driver flat blade, tooth pick and tweezers, but no saw, separate screw drivers, etc.

I have carried the small Swiss Army Knife shown for over 30 years now.

 

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I love Paris in the springtime …

Posted on February 5, 2020 by Robert

Paris 19th c street scene by Eugene Atget courtesy of the Paris museums

Toronto. One of the 19th century photographers I admire is Eugene Atget. My friend and fellow PHSC member Russ Forfar sent me a note on Atget et al recently.

Russ said that the Paris, France museums (some 14) have collectively decided to put some 60,000 plus famous photographs online and free to be used by all.

Russ sent me a link to the story in this petapixel article by Michael Zhang. Michael included the links to the photographs.

Note that the title of this post was borrowed from the song “I Love Paris“, sung here by Ella Fitzgerald.

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double trouble

Posted on February 4, 2020 by Robert

Home Made Ukrainian stereo camera

Toronto. There is a growing debate these days about Russian (and American) interference in the affairs of other countries. Certainly the situation is not helped by our neighbour’s president, the Donald. For a change here’s some good news. My friend and fellow PHSC member, Celio Barreto,  sent me this interesting story from Kosmo Foto.

The story was released on the 30th of last month and told of a Ukrainian half frame home made stereo camera. While the execution is a bit primitive according to the story and photos, the camera appears to take good stereo pictures.

Have a read and think about subscribing to the site, especially if you favour the old school cameras and films.

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