Stereo cameras

[alanrockwood]

After using a stereo viewer to look at some very old stereo photos taken by my wife's grandfather, I just bought two old stereo cameras, one is a Stereo Realist and the other is a Sputnik.

Would anyone like to comment on stereo photography: equipment, techniques, aesthetics, etc.?

Thanks.

 

[Trask]

I collect stereo views, particularly of places I've lived (Congo, Middle East, etc.), and have an original viewer. I've even got a slide bar so I can make stereo photos of static subjects. I even bought two identical Rollei 35S cameras for stereo photography, then managed to lose one! But I've held off buying a stereo camera even though I've collected enough information about them, simply because I don't think I've got time for another photographic exercise. Maybe after I retire! So I envy your moving ahead on this aspect of our hobby. FYI, there are any number of stereoscopic societies and clubs, and there used to be a great resource at http://www.drt3d.com/ which I see is being revised. Good luck with your stereo photography!

 

[Photo Engineer]

There was a Kodak Stereo club. Kodak made stereo projectors, and one of my friends has written a program to take the Nikon 3D prism attachment and make digital prints for the old wood stereo viewers.

PE

 

[bsdunek]

I find stereo a lot of fun. I, too, use a slide bar, and make prints for my old stereo viewer. I should refurbish a stereo camera from my collection so I can do it right.

 

[Nodda Duma]

I just finished mounting stereo slides from a roll of Velvia 50 that I put through my Stereo Realist. Some of them came out very nice. The optics on the Realist are great and I found that the shutter timing is dead-on at the faster speeds (1/10 or greater).

I plan to scan them and start a stereo picture thread, since the resolution in the gallery is a bit limited for showing both frames. That said I do have a couple I posted to the gallery which turned out nice.


You can get slide mounts and protector sheets on eBay. When you send your slide film off to be developed, make sure you specify not to cut the frames.

 

[OptiKen]

I have both a Kodak and a Realist stereo cameras (acquired this year). I'm trying to run a roll of B&W print film through my Kodak right now and ran one roll through the Realist (Color print).
I didn't know how to work the Realist so only got 2 shots that worked well but it was enough to inspire me. Making the slides for a print viewer is still a challenge to me.
I've since shot 2 rolls of Velvia slide film in the Realist and am waiting until I have at least 5 rolls to develop for some sort of economy. My E-6 kit is sitting in my photo closet now.

 

[Lee Rust]

Stereo can be a lot of fun. I have a Realist for slides and a Zeiss Contaflex Steritar attachment for prints. Here's an online source for all sorts of viewers, mounts, books and 3D knicknacks ... http://www.berezin.com/3d/

 

[summicron1]

Interesting you should ask -- I was wondering if anyone here shot stereo, there are no forums on it.

I just got back from the annual 3-D Con of the National Stereoscopic Association in Salt Lake City. I've shot 3-D for a very long time in multiple formats, including Viewmaster, and was interested to see where the national club was at.

A friend and I went and took our Realists and felt out of place -- we were, so far as I could see, the only film shooters there. Everyone was using digital -- either twin cameras or Fuji or Panasonic stereo digital cameras, or rigs that involved shifting the camera. There's a LOT of really excellent 3-D film being done, but not one dealer at the trade fair had used film cameras for sale -- although the location, in a ski resort in Utah at a relatively small gathering because of troubles with another location, may have had a hand in this.

If you are interested, Stereo World magazine covers all aspects of the hobby, http://stereoworld.org.

I took a Kin-Dar stereo on a recent trip to NYC -- it is smaller and lighter than a Realist and has a built-in rangefinder -- and am busy printing up pairs from that in b/w. It isn't hard after you get the enlarger set to the right size. Just make one print, shift the negatives three frames, print the second the same as the first, and glue them to a piece of cardboard.

This is interesting -- Brian May, lead guitar of "Queen," is an avid stereo photographer. He also sells really excellent 3-D print viewers and books. You can see his stuff at http://www.londonstereo.com. Follow the links, you can see a lot of his stuff, including the 3-D views of Pluto he produced during the recent satellite mission to there. I bought some stereo viewers from him. He was quite a nice guy, very interested in buying vintage 3-D views of England.

 

[summicron1]

After using a stereo viewer to look at some very old stereo photos taken by my wife's grandfather, I just bought two old stereo cameras, one is a Stereo Realist and the other is a Sputnik.

Would anyone like to comment on stereo photography: equipment, techniques, aesthetics, etc.?

Thanks.

the Sputnik is a good camera to use because yu can contact print the pairs and then just transpose the images to view.

One caveat -- the inside of the Sputnik is shiny black plastic, typical of Russki cameras. Mask over the inside of the lenses and spray-paint the interior of the camera with some nice flat black spray primer paint to deaden the reflections and you have a good shooter.

 

[1L6E6VHF]

I have both a Fuji W3 digital stereo camera, as well as two 3.5 Realists and a Sputnik. The W3 is far more convenient and of course far less expensive to operate, but I still use my Realists as well, because the stereo experience on the W3 is more-or-less limited to that little lenticular LCD screen on the back of my camera. In contrast, I can use a stereo slide in my Realist viewer to see the image nearly fill my field of view in brilliant color, with the light transmitted directly through the slide and the optics directly into my eyes (viewing a slide with this type of light produces beautiful sight even with conventional slides, but with stereo, it is in both eyes as well as three dimensions). I can also project them in 3-D using my stereo projector (at the club meetings, we've been using two digital projectors with polarizers, but that is expensive, the setup is cumbersome, and strange distortions in the stereo space tend to be created (the background often appears "corrugated")

Though many have used stereo cameras with color negative to produce Holmes cards, I strongly recommend E6 and a stereo slide viewer - it just looks so much sharper and more life-like to my eyes.

Another thought: Anyone beside me think that the Fuji W3 at the 3 megapixel setting gives identical results to the 10 megapixel mode? Could it be that with its tiny lenses and sensors, that the higher pixel counts are just a waste of memory card space?

 

[djacobox372]

I've shot hundreds of stereo pairs using 120 slide film on the sputnik. Here are some things I've learned:

-Avoid shooting wide apertures, I never go wider than f16, and try to stay at f22.

-Avoid out of focus elements nearer than the subject, blurry objects between the viewer and the subject are off-putting

-Stereo is most effective when capturing low-relief texture up close, or wet/reflective environments. Stereo images shot on a rainy day are incredible.

-With slide film, I underexpose by 1.5-2 stops. Blown out highlights really ruin the illusion

-Keep your subjects close to the camera, the 3D effect drops significantly after about 7 feet.

-If you want to shoot more distant subjects. Don't be afraid to experiment with wider stereo distances by using lens caps on the sputnik to expose one side at a time. There's a general rule in stereo photography that states for the most pronounced stereo effect you want the distance between the lenses to be 1/30th the distance to the subject--this is about 6.5 feet with the standard lens distance.