Panoramic Photographs Ever seen a panoramic camera? I don't mean a $12.95 disposable Fuji from Walgreen's. I mean a real panoramic camera like they used to use a lot to take pictures of class reunions, firemen's balls, skylines, etc. The really good ones were made of wood, a cube a foot or more on the side, with this huge lens. They looked like something Captain Nemo might have used on his 20,000-league voyage. To take a picture, you had to mount the thing on a large tripod, because taking a picture consisted of clicking the shutter and then standing back as the device turned slowly through 180 degrees, or 240 degrees, or whatever size of panorama you had set it for. The film came in roll form. The catch was: one roll = one picture. As the camera turned, the film would slowly wind past the open shutter. And we're talking contact prints here. What kind of enlarger could you get a negative into that's 8 inches high and 40 inches long? (Curious trivia note: Though the demand is not high, Kodak still makes film to fit these old cameras.) For about 50 years, roughly 1875-1925, panoramics were big business. Lodge halls, V.F.W. halls, and the like were filled with their products. The fad passed and by the 1930s hardly anyone was using the technology. The Library of Congress has a stunning
collection of old panoramics, which you can find here. I spent a delightful
couple of days going through them (some call this work!). Here's just a tiny sampling: 1. Army Aero Squadron, Texas City Aerodrome, 1913 (218k). 2. Philadelphia Athletics, 1913 (137k). 3. Georgia Cotton Field, 1915 (95k). 4. San Francisco, 1910 (128k). 5. Nanking University, China, 1920 (151k). Reader Submission: Nanjing University, 2003 (181k). 6. Owentsia Hunt Ball, Chicago, 1904 (92k). 7. Fort Crockett, Galveston, Texas, 1918 (114k). 8. Shriners' Beauty Parade, Venice Beach, California, 1925 (134k). 9. Waterfall (n.d.) (38k). --Diebold Essen, Editor, The Arts |
