Merry Christmas 2019 All!

Posted on December 25, 2019 by Robert

Toronto. Lots of snow. Green snow? Ho Ho Ho. Click on the birds to see the website I used.

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silhouette

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Robert

John Morden made this photo for  Instagram.

Toronto. This famous photographer was born in Germany and emigrated to the USA in 1935, prior to the second war to join LIFE magazine. He had already made a name in Europe before moving with his family to America. His name… Alfred Eisenstaedt.

In the silhouette, Eisenstaedt is holding his IIIf Leica. It is part of a series on famous photographers and their cameras that we posted on our Instagram site.

My thanks to John Morden for sharing this image with me. He originally created it for our Instagram guru, Celio Barreto, who found the series to be very popular.

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Camerama Show Jan 19, 2020

Posted on December 23, 2019 by Robert

Toronto. Do you have 2020 vision? Its Camerama time again on Jan 19th.

Click on the little camera at left for a full size bookmark with directions. Been there before? Same location (Edward Hotel). Same parking. Get in for $7 or for $5 if you are a student with ID.

Need more info, or a table, call Gary at 905-550-7477 or just email him

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PhotoEd Winter 2019

Posted on December 22, 2019 by Robert

PhotoEd Magazine Winter 2019

Toronto. Editor Rita Godlevskis told us about this coming issue last August along with free passes for members to a documentary.

Check out this exciting issue’s articles and photos. The PHSC is represented with this ad on page 23.

Check the newsstands and the PhotoEd website.

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deja vu all over again

Posted on December 21, 2019 by Robert

Graphic camera used in late 2019

Toronto. … as colourful catcher and coach for the Yankees, Yogi Berra was tagged with this quote. In pursuit of history, my good friend George Dunbar spotted this anomaly in the age of digital – someone using a film/plate based Speed Graphic with a huge lens at an event during the President Trump impeachment trial.

George says, “It was certainly surprising to see a photographer with a 4×5 Graphic press camera at the USA impeachment hearings.” Surprising indeed!

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free filmin’

Posted on December 20, 2019 by Robert

LIFE ad May 9, 1960

Toronto. Free Film forever! And Kodak film at that! Who could resist such a pitch? In my youth, I remember these pitches to casual amateurs to encourage camera use and printing.  The hook was, you mailed your exposed roll in, and for a fee, the prints, negatives, and a fresh roll of the same film was returned to you by mail.

The “never buy film again” meant not changing film kind or brand ever and waiting a week or two to get your free unexposed film, negs and prints returned.

Thanks to George Dunbar and his research for this memory jogger ad from the May 9, 1960 issue of LIFE magazine (a tiny ad on p110). I suspect that the “FREE FILM CO.” didn’t last as long as Kodak…. Never found out if the FREE FILM CO. would accept exposed film from Canada back when it advertised in LIFE.

NB: The title of this post is a riff off the title of a song “Free Fallin’” sung by the late Tom Petty amongst others.

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no direction home

Posted on December 19, 2019 by Robert

Compass Camera c1937

Toronto. The c1937 sub miniature camera called the Compass is designed in the UK and made in Switzerland. It uses 35 mm film (cut or roll) in a full frame format.

The design is the opposite of the 35mm camera made by Leitz. The Leica is a utilitarian design and fits the hand comfortably. Any added functions like stereo, filters, closeups, levels, panorama aids etc. require accessories. On the other hand,  the Compass is complex to use since all these common accessories are built-in and demand a heavy learning curve.

NB: The title of this post is a line from Bob Dylan’s 1965 single “Like a Rolling Stone” which I have on the album “Highway 61 Revisited” from the same year.

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clock work cameras

Posted on December 18, 2019 by Robert

a 1996 re-creation of a panoramic photograph using a Cirkut camera

Toronto. Panoramic photographs were popular early to mid last century. Group shots were often the subject of panoramics. Various ways were used to create images with one extra long side – mostly horizontal but occasionally vertical.

Cameras could be steady and their lens and shutter rotated from side to side (eg Kodak Panoram series). Or both camera and film could be rotated (eg Cirkut). A prank that was possible with the rather slow rotating Cirkut camera was to appear twice in a photograph. Someone on the far edge of the group once recorded had time to run quickly in back and appear once again on the far side!

When computers of suitable power came along, a series of overlapping stills could be stitched together to create a panoramic photo. Modern day smart phones simply have an option to create panoramas as you carefully rotate either side to side or up and down following an arrow on the smart phone screen.

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a far wider point of view

Posted on December 17, 2019 by Robert

Photography at Length

Toronto. Even before Photography there were painted mural panoramas. With the advent of the art of photography various cameras were created to create the super wide angle  panoramas.

My mother had a panorama photograph of her and her first sister taken in 1928 by a photographer in Kitchener. The panorama recorded all the students and teachers at the King Edward (Burton Avenue) School in Allandale. I made a half dozen phots of the parts of the school panorama including the centre portion.

Brian Polden in the UK wrote a 500+ page book called “Photography at Length” The authentic History of Panoramic Cameras. It was published August 2019 by a UK firm “The Bardwell Press“. Journal editor Bob Lansdale assisted the author and confirmed the Canadian content. This brief review was included in the mailing of the current journal issue (45-3).

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wow – movies

Posted on December 16, 2019 by Robert

Kodak Brownie Movie Camera ad c1960

Toronto. 8mm home movies were all the rage over a half century ago. Fuelled by cheap equipment, fast lenses, and colour film, movie gear was one dimension of a push for a share of the blossoming post war amateur market.

Not only content to earn sales income from colour film, Kodak entered the 8mm market offering low cost cameras and gear. With well known brands in Kodak and Brownie, the mighty company embraced a future where every camera sold was another market for Kodak’s money-maker:  film.

This 1960 ad from Life magazine (April 11, 1960, p 67) is typical of the ads bought by marketeers in their push for a segment of the burgeoning home movie market.

My father-in-law was using a Brownie like this one to record his vacation trips. But by the time I married, the movie fad had faded for him and I only remember the one movie of his trip out west. My thanks to George Dunbar for this piece of history.

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