Strings and springs and things

Shutter on Kodak No. 1 camera in 1888

Toronto. In 1888, George Eastman concocted a camera to use his newly invented stripping film. He famously named the well constructed box camera the Kodak. Since the film was too fast in sunlight to use a lens cap as a shutter, Eastman used a long cylinder and springs as a shutter for instantaneous (and time) photographs.

A string was pulled to cock the shutter and when the button was pressed for a picture, spring power rotated the cylinder to briefly expose the film to the scene via a fixed f/9 rapid-rectilinear lens.

Note that the illustrations are courtesy of Brian Coe’s book Cameras mentioned in an earlier post.

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