hurry up and slow down

Posted on October 3, 2023 by Robert

a real time, ultrahigh-speed mapping (DRUM) camera. Pictured are researchers Xianglei Liu and Jinyang Liang working on the optical setup at INRS, Quebec

Toronto.We usually cover old still photographic items in these posts, but today I take a look at movies (motion using the brain’s persistence and a rapidly projected series of frames).

Frame rate can noticeably affect a movie. When a movie is projected at the regular speed each frame is held briefly and projected giving what appears to be a natural motion on screen. If the movie camera records many frames in a given period, they appear to be projected in slow motion. And contrarily, if there are too few frames recorded, projection makes the action appear in fast motion – ie. a person walking is recorded and then seems to run when projected. Or a slow process (i.e. multi day) can be speeded up on projection (time lapse).

These events, are often used for entertainment or education (time lapse). However; some short term events (sub second) are of scientific interest. How can they be recorded and slowed down for projection? By using a special high speed camera! Unfortunately, physical limitations and media sensitivity set a boundary for the camera’s success.

Now Payal Dhar writes for the IEEE journal about a Quebec team’s success using optics to extend that boundary in, “A Cheaper Ultrafast Camera Required Looking to Optics The new “DRUM camera” can capture up to 4.8 million frames per second“.

Take a few minutes to read Payal’s article and see one direction scientific photography is going in the future (it will be history – in about 50-100 years – we are just a bit early here …).  Another tip of the hat to my good friend, George Dunbar, for spotting and sharing this unusual article in the IEEE Journal (the Journal is a free PDF download to IEEE members).

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an innovator called Karl

Posted on October 2, 2023 by Robert

camera designer Karl Nüchterlein, courtesy of Theme (photography daily)

Toronto. You have likely used his designs or innovations, especially if you took photographs last century with smaller roll film cameras (127 and 35mm) or used an SLR.

A young Dutchman, Johan Steenbergen, moved to Dresden in 1912 where he established a camera factory which he named Ihagee (IHG), the abbreviation for the German expression, “Industrie- und Handelsgesellschaft”.

In 1923, a talented camera designer of the name Karl Nüchterlein joined Ihagee. Karl designed the VP Exakta using 127 roll film in 1933, followed three years later in 1936 by the Kine Exakta using 35mm film. These were the first small SLR designs. The  Exaktas were different in the fact they were designed for the left handed folk – key controls were on the top left, not top right!

While the cameras were of an interchangeable lens design, compromises had to be made to clear the necessary mirror mechanism. Normal lenses were 55-58mm, and any lens with a shorter focal length had to be specially designed to keep the rear lens elements clear of the mirror at infinity focus. A means to focus the lens at full aperture, then stop down for shooting was important.

Karl made other innovations at Ihagee, in addition to the first 127 and 35mm SLR cameras, including, the camera film winder lever, and a flash socket that was shutter activated.

WW2 was devastating for Ihagee with the deadly bombing of Dresden and the post war decision to put Dresden in the Russian zone. The Exakta survived for years after the war – my first interchangeable lens 35mm was an Exakta VXIIa, at the time more expensive than a Leica. When I bought the VXIIa around 1959, the shorter focal length lenses were often a ‘retro focus’ design with horrendous geometric distortion (both barrel and pin cushion).

Years later I realized the majority of my exposures were with a wide-angle lens, not the 50mm lens or a telephoto.

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a field of reads

Posted on October 1, 2023 by Robert

Alfred Stieglitz ca. 1904 or 1907 by Heinrich Kuhn

Toronto. Ken Metcalf sent along the issue 2 2023 of the Graflex  Journal devoted to, “SHARING INFORMATION ABOUT GRAFLEX AND THEIR CAMERAS”. You can see the back issues by visiting the journal web site here.

Issue 2 2023 has these major articles:
–  A Treasure From My Collection by David Bridge
–  Photographic Equipment of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 1817
–  Cameras from the Smithsonian®
–  Dream Street – book review by George Dunbar
–  Attachment: Graflex Lensboards by Thomas Evans

Note: The title of this post is a riff on the 1989 movie, “Field of Dreams“. The movie is based on Canadian novelist W. P. Kinsella‘s 1982 novel Shoeless Joe.

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help!

Posted on September 30, 2023 by Robert

AEB August, 1906. What is the costume worn??

Toronto. At a recent PHSC auction, one lot of photographs included the photo at left. The lady seems to be wearing an unusual costume with what looks like padded bloomers. Also, the lady seems to have vaguely Oriental facial features. The photograph frame does not seem to have a photographer or studio identification.

Journal co-editor David Bridge writes in part, “Hope you are enjoying this warm late summer.  We found the attached lady in a bag of photos Louise bought … at the last auction.  The only inscription on the back [is] ‘AEB Aug 1906’.  Lorne Shields is unable to definitively say that this is a bicycling outfit – perhaps your multi-talented readers can come up with some further fashion opinion?  Skiing outfit? In August? What’s in the pocket?”

Okay folks, if you recognize the person or clothing, please let David know!. Write me at info@phsc.ca and I will pass the message on.

Note: The title is the same as the title of the popular Beatles song of  1965, “Help!“.

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a debt unpaid

Posted on September 29, 2023 by Robert

children and military helicopter in El Salvador, by James Nachtwey, courtesy of BBC News

Toronto. … promise made is a debt unpaid … as Robert Service wrote in his 1907 epic Yukon poem, “The Cremation of Sam McGee“. Service was born in England and lived in many places, including Canada (he once worked for the Toronto Star).

The ‘debt unpaid’ is by all of us to the photojournalists of the world who bravely burst into areas of natural disaster, human disaster, and  conflict  (war, civil insurrection, etc.) to bring us more timid souls the stories and photos of what is happening.

It should be noted that our society has had many Canadian photojournalists as guest speakers over the years, most recently Louis Palu in May of 2019.

Typical of photojournalism is the life and work of, “James Nachtwey: The last of the great photojournalists” as captured by Jonathan Head for the BBC News.

As to Nachtwey, who often worked in black and white film, Head writes in part. ” … In some images, though, the colour really stands out. An early photograph from the El Salvador civil war [top, left of this post] shows a military helicopter evacuating an injured soldier. But it is the three little girls crouching behind a tree in the foreground, their dresses of white, pink and pastel blue standing out in the orange dust cloud, who give the image its haunting loveliness.”

My thanks to my good friend, George Dunbar, who recently came across this BBC News article and shared it with me.

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expensive words

Posted on September 28, 2023 by Robert

Sir John Franklin c1845 courtesy of Sotheby’s

Toronto. The old chestnut says a picture is worth a 1000 words. If so, the 14,000 words for these 14 daguerreotypes are worth nearly $39 USD each! Many Canadians remember the stories of Franklin and his two ill-fated vessels, the HMS Erebus and the HMS Terror which became locked in our ice while searching for the NorthWest Passage. The ship wrecks were discovered nearly a decade ago in this century.

Long unseen, the set of 14 portraits were auctioned off recently by Sotheby’s and realized about $545,580 USD on September 21, 2023. The daguerreotypes were taken on board the HMS Erebus in 1845 just days before it set sail on its last voyage. The portraits were taken using technology less than seven years old. Needless to say, they were the last portraits taken of the senior crew of the two vessels and the officers of the HMS Erebus.

My thanks to PHSC President, Clint Hryhorijiw, for alerting me to this sale.  You can read about the set and the last voyage of Franklin and his crew here on ArtNet News. Remember, it is the subject as well as age, photographer, and condition that determines a daguerreotype’s value. Expensive words, indeed!

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hot pix, it’s a phoney; hot pix it’s a phoney …

Posted on September 27, 2023 by Robert

cover of latest Canada’s History Magazine

Toronto.  … with apologies to Karen Shopsowitz and her family. You couldn’t live here 60 years ago without hearing the jingle, “hotdog, it’s a Shopsy” or visit the city without buying one of those delicious hot dogs from her father’s delicatessen.

Karen spoke to the PHSC at the September 15, 2004 meeting recounting her father’s enthusiasm for home movies.

Any art item deemed rare, expensive, or famous is at risk of duplication. Paintings, cameras, photographs are typically copied and presented for sale.

For example, towards the closing of one of our shows, an old gentleman showed up and offered a dealer an old Leica with a brass nameplate across the back engraved with the name of an infamous Nazi officer who had died at the Nuremberg trials. The dealer bought the camera but I missed photographing it.

Calling the dealer later, he said the camera was a well preserved fake. The camera’s age, colour, engravings and serial number made the ownership plausible leading to his decision to buy. Once home, he carefully inspected his bargain only to discover a single glaring error: the name had a missing umlaut – just as bad as a spelling error in English! Nevertheless, the camera was in fine condition and he elected to keep it as an example of a fine fake.

The latest issue of Canada’s History magazine sparked this post. In notifying me of the magazine’s article on a famous military photograph that proved to be fake, George Dunbar writes, “Canadian photo historians will certainly be interested in this feature article, ‘Over the Top,’ in the latest issue of Canada’s History magazine (Oct/Nov 2023).

“This is a fascinating exposé of the creation of faked First World War photographs by Canadian officials and a British photographer.”.

 

 

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you can call me Max

Posted on September 26, 2023 by Robert

the Berek designed 5cm Elmar lens in a Barnack designed lens mount

Toronto. As you know, a camera needs a lens to capture an image. Leitz had just such a lens designer. In 1912 according to Dr Kingslake in his 1989 book, “A History of the Photographic Lens“, a young Dr Max Berek joined the Leitz microscope company in Wetzlar. Max was “…devoted almost entirely to the theory of the microscope, in particularly the polarizing microscope used in mineralogy.”.

A rather highly corrected sub-stage microscope condenser was named after Berek. In the photographic world, Berek was of assistance to Oskar Barnack as the designer of the 5cm f/3.5 Elmar. According to Kingslake, “When the Leica camera was being developed by Oskar Barnack in the early 1920s, Berek designed several suitable lenses, including the Elmar, Summar, Summitar, and Hektor series.”

The patent sheet above is for the lens mount designed by Barnack to house the lens designed by Berek. Some attribute the Elmar design to a variation of the Zeiss Tessar, but others note that at the time the Tessar design could not cover the inch by 1.5 inch (24 x 36mm) field of the Leica at f/3.5 and suggest the Elmar is based on another fundamental lens design.

Note: The title of this post is a riff on Paul Simon’s song, “You Can Call Me Al” from his 1986 Graceland album (I have the CD).

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an Oscar for design

Posted on September 25, 2023 by Robert

NYC street scene in 1914

Toronto. In 1914, a young German visited NYC. He brought along a tiny experimental ‘device’ that looked nothing like the cameras of the day.

He took photos like the one at left with the people on the street oblivious to his activity. The man was the son of the German owner of a microscope factory with a branch operation in NYC.

The man was Ernst Leitz II and the strange device was later known as the ‘Ur-Leica’ manufactured by his father’s company just months before his voyage and visit  to the ‘New World’. The design was the ‘brain child’ of a mechanic at Leitz known as Oskar Barnack. Oskar was fascinated by movies and had made a moving picture camera. The process of the day demanded a film strip be exposed at various stops and developed to determine the correct exposure.

According to the 15th edition of the Leica Manual, the device used a fixed shutter speed of 1/40th second, matching the moving picture camera’s speed. Properly exposed, the resulting negatives routinely gave a good image easily enlarged. For many years others  debated whether the tiny gadget was intended to determine a moving picture camera’s ideal aperture or as an alternative camera using the common 35mm movie film of the day.

In any case, the designer of this tiny, precision and utilitarian camera was Barnack. After the great war, Germany sunk into a massive depression and rampaging inflation. In an effort to retain skilled staff, Ernst Leitz II decided to manufacture the Leica in spite of the scepticism of his company board and the changes in the 35mm movie film that traded off resolution for softer contrast and a greater sensitivity.

The Leica was a phenomenal success. The built-in rangefinder was also the brain child of Barnack who decreed its small size (Leitz made rangefinders well before Leicas). Slight magnification compensated for the shortened rangefinder base. As Lipinski hinted in his book, “Miniature and Precision Cameras”, Leitz used and patented all the simpler ways to make a precision camera thus handicapping competitors by forcing greater complexity and  higher manufacturing costs.

It was only after WW2 that the basic design created by Barnack was replaced with the Series-M cameras – so successful that even today the design can be seen in digital Leicas and in lens mounts made by some competitors.

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celebrating niche enthusiasts

Posted on September 24, 2023 by Robert

Cover Shot of Classic Cameras by Ivor Matanle

Toronto. You may have noticed that a small group of photographers continue to use film, preferring its ambiance  over digital technology. It may be a novelty to you having old technology linger on, but this has occurred over the centuries as new replaced old in many other disciplines.

Hindsight of time shows the benefit of the new over the old, but at the time a change was introduced, benefits were far less obvious. For example, photographers who had an investment in daguerreotype photography were reluctant to spend more money and learning time on ‘new fangled’ ideas.

I noticed this overlap of old and new while digging into the history of our chosen art. While I can see the benefits, practitioners of old were far slower to adopt the new ideas – sometimes taking many years. A modern day quandary is here now! Digital technology has been around for a couple of decades and has generally improved to the point were the majority of professionals and serious amateurs prefer digital only processes.

But not all! There is still a small selection of totally or partially film based photographers. These folk are well served by PHSC events such as the coming Fall Fair on October 15th. Both collectors and users may find films, film cameras and film accessories ready for their collections and user gear.

The cover shot above is Ivor Matanle’s 1986 opus on ‘Classic Cameras’ which I bought directly from Ivor. In his 224 page book with 320 B&W illustrations – cameras and the photographs taken with them – he covers both collecting and using these mechanical marvels from the ‘golden age’ of minicam photography. Now out of print, you can track down a used copy (this soft cover printing is dated 1992) or try to borrow a copy via your local library.

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