Bill_1856
11-Jul-2009, 20:47
I was rewatching Ken Burns' "The Civil War," when it suddenly occured to me "what size plates were these images made on" and what lens focal lengths were generally used?
After spending an hour surfing the web trying to find any hints, all that I found was that (probably) most of the images were made on 3x6 stereo plates, but couldn't find anything at all about the straight "scenic" photographs. The portraits, of course, were mostly tintypes of about 4x5 or 4 shots on a single 7x9 wet negative, or perhaps quarter-plate.
I'm sure that many of the views were taken with more than one size camera, but I could find no specific information! Surely 8x10 (or perhaps full-plate) were most common? Perhaps some of the time megasize cameras were used (or did these only come after the War by O'Sullivan and Watkins, etc)?
The Rapid-Rectilinear lens hadn't been invented, so I expect that mostly focal lengths of 2X the plate width were required (our optical standard of focal length=plate diagonal would not have been likely).
Any information would be appreciated.Thanks.
After spending an hour surfing the web trying to find any hints, all that I found was that (probably) most of the images were made on 3x6 stereo plates, but couldn't find anything at all about the straight "scenic" photographs. The portraits, of course, were mostly tintypes of about 4x5 or 4 shots on a single 7x9 wet negative, or perhaps quarter-plate.
I'm sure that many of the views were taken with more than one size camera, but I could find no specific information! Surely 8x10 (or perhaps full-plate) were most common? Perhaps some of the time megasize cameras were used (or did these only come after the War by O'Sullivan and Watkins, etc)?
The Rapid-Rectilinear lens hadn't been invented, so I expect that mostly focal lengths of 2X the plate width were required (our optical standard of focal length=plate diagonal would not have been likely).
Any information would be appreciated.Thanks.