Stereo camera film photography

[dragonblade71]

When I first got into 3D photography a number of years ago, I was using a regular 35mm SLR and the so called 'cha cha' method with slide film. Basically sequential 3D shooting. Although the results were great, I was very limited with the sort of subjects I could shoot. I was restricted to static scenes with no movement.

About a year ago, I purchased an old stereo camera that was manufactured during the 1950s. This allowed the shooting of subjects with movement. Not long ago, I exposed a roll of Kodak Ektar 100 colour negative film with the camera. This is one of the stereo pairs I captured with that film (cross-eye version.) The subject is a beach at Penneshaw, Kangaroo Island in South Australia, Australia.



I actually didn't know the lab was going to scan the film after developing. I gave instructions to a family member who dropped off the film to the lab but I did not request scanning. The thing is that this camera exposes frames that are considerably narrower than standard sized frames on 35mm film. And the lab scanned the frames as if they were 'full frame.' So many of the digitised pictures are chopped up into small bits. Occasionally, there are whole frames. That beach cross-eye above is one of the very few stereo pairs that I was able to salvage from the butchered scans.

 

[Hardus nameous]

That's awesome! I've seen the old stereo cameras but never the pictures. I thought you needed a special viewer but sure enough I crossed my eyes and it worked perfectly. I might have to pick one up sometime; I wonder if they were ever.made in 120?

 

[dragonblade71]

I'm impressed that you were able to do cross-eye viewing straight away. Previously, I wasn't able to do any cross-eye viewing until I came across a good tutorial on how to do it. I believe there are some stereo cameras that accept 120 film but I don't think there would be many such models like that. Most of these types of cameras used 35mm film. However, viewing medium format transparencies in a 3D viewer would be an awesome experience with all that fine detail. Or alternatively cross-eye viewing as seen here. I have mounted some of my 35mm transparencies in stereo mounts. Viewing them with a 3D viewer is great fun but the mounting is very time consuming (adjusting the placement of the stereo window.)

 

[rosenkrieger]

That's really cool. I wish I could see these the way you guys do, but unfortunately, being blind in one eye kinda puts a damper on that. lol. On the subject of digitizing these, though, you can buy your own 35mm film scanner. That's what I did back in college when I was shooting and developing my own black and white film.

 

[The Snark]

@dragonblade71 Thanks for the nausea and memories.

I'm impressed that you were able to do cross-eye viewing straight away.

A pro photographer friend was once employed by the government, USGS, to take stereoscopic pictures of the coastline. The coast guard was employed. He showed me the results, hundreds of shots from helicopters at all sorts of angles including straight down. He told me to look cross-eyed at the pictures which is easy for me. Only took a dozen or so shots before I became intensely nauseated.
A major sticking point in my memory was him showing me his impressive cameras and post processing gear. I asked how much it all cost. "Right around $100,000."
They were film cameras. The CGAS provided very precise data on locations of the shots and exact altitudes they were taken at.
Weird how those pictures can affect your inner ear, especially if you tilt your head in crosseyed stereo mode.

 

[dragonblade71]

Rosenkrieger, yea buying my own scanner is an option. Though from what Ive heard, they're not always the best choice for stereo pairs. Due to the narrow width of the negs / transparencies, the scanner may be influenced by the frame next to the frame that you're trying to scan and that could result in a digitised image that is too dark or too light. My plan is to digitise the negs with an M4/3 mirrorless camera and macro lens. And with full manual exposure, I can make any kind of adjustment as necessary.

Snark, sorry for bring back the nausea! That sounds like a very interesting shoot that your friend did. Since he was shooting the coastline from a helicopter, I assume he was using a regular camera rather than a stereo camera.

I remember watching a documentary on TV about an English plane photographing enemy infrastructure during WW2 in stereo. Basically aerial photographs in 3D. Though what puzzled me was the twin lens stereo system they attached to the plane. With the plane being hundreds of feet up in the air, surely a stereo camera system would record very flat images. They would look more like regular 2D photographs. You can get very effective stereo images from a plane (by using a normal camera.) All you need to do is take a sequence of photos at short intervals as the plane flies over the landscape. A stereo camera is not necessary at that distance. Though in this doco, they were claiming that the 3D aerial photos of the enemy sites were recorded with this specialised stereo equipment mounted to the plane. A very interesting piece of WW2 technology but it certainly defied logic.

 

[The Snark]

That sounds like a very interesting shoot that your friend did. Since he was shooting the coastline from a helicopter, I assume he was using a regular camera rather than a stereo camera.

I got curious as to what my friend's photoshoot purpose was. Went digging, got hopelessly confused, all about photogrammetry. They redrew the USGS topographic maps of the entire east and west coasts of the US correcting them. The coastlines with numerous fixed navigational markers and hazards in coordination with triangulated satellite markers (we had one in our driveway a USGS technician operated for a satellite flyby).
More to home and something I can relate to was Prisoner Rock in Trinidad bay got moved in the marine navigation map about 40 feet. They also corrected the mean high water tide lines.
Also they capitalized on the new MH 65 Dolphin helicopters with their ability to 'park' in mid air at any elevation using the radio navigational system built into them. So we're not talking way up in the air fly bys but choppers down as low as 50 feet above terrain.

I'd really like to read you explaining how all those things come together and give me a clearer understanding of how all that works.

I remember a MH 65 came into our hospital for the first time doing navigational checks. A celebration for us as the helicopters they had been using were left overs from the Korean war and barely cleared a doctors office on take off. The MH 65 stopped over a cow pasture about a hundred feet from our helipad and just sat there, maybe 50 feet up, for a few minutes. Then it went straight up a couple hundred feet and parked again, then came down and landed briefly. Explained to me that they were fixing our radio antenna and the helipad into their navigational system which would enable them to land blind at night. Before then we had no air evacs or air patient transfers except during daylight.

It was really weird for me having worked ambulance and been on numerous air evacs. Seeing a chopper come in and park in mid air. Sitting there motionless. The MH 65 had different aerodynamic properties. Instead of the loud chunk chunk sound of normal helicopters it has a high pitched whine.