Studio Portrait camera, 1956

[blockend]

Pathé movie short featuring 1950s glamour girl, Sabrina. It features a square format commercial portrait camera of some kind. Any guesses on the manufacturer? Seems to be roll film taking at least 48 frames, although glass plates are mentioned.
Sabrina (1956) - YouTube

 

[blockend]

The size and simplicity of design suggest it may be an adapted WW2 aerial reconnaissance camera. Pack films were popular for walk-in commercial studio cameras, but there are no obvious contenders. If it was made for studio photography it was clearly for use by non-specialists, although there is a reflex focusing device. The huge plinth was typical of portrait cameras of the era. Were there any falling plate cameras with designs this late? It looks more like a predecessor of the photo booth, or a direct positive camera.

 

[Dan Fromm]

The size and simplicity of design suggest it may be an adapted WW2 aerial reconnaissance camera.

To my eye it isn't remotely like an aerial camera.[/QUOTE]

 

[blockend]

To my eye it isn't remotely like an aerial camera.

I'm not suggesting it is an aerial camera, I have seen large, flat, box type cameras being loaded into Lancaster bombers, and the lack of control suggests an industrial or military context. I'm surprised someone hasn't been along to say what kind of camera it is.

 

[Dan Fromm]

Well, it appears to be fixed focus. There are no obvious exposure controls, i.e., shutter speed or aperture. Turning the crank fires the shutter and advances the film. Highly specialized device. Not what school photographers used when I was a child, or the portrait photographers to whose studios my parents dragged me.

Lancasters? I don't recall anything like a "large, flat, box type camera" in Roy Conyers Nesbit's book Eyes of the RAF. Were you very young when you saw a Lancaster being loaded?

 

[AgX]

The puzzling thing is that one expects a 42-lens camera, but it is not.

The clue likely is the logo of the manufacturer. But we only got the very first bit...

Could be "PL", which fits the chain that used that camera.

 

[AgX]

A likely smaller version

 

[AgX]

https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co8210180/polyfoto-camera-plate-camera

http://www.photodetective.co.uk/Polyfoto.html


I was not even able to count correctly above...
The "48-Camera"
http://www.polyfoto.co.uk

 

[Dan Fromm]

Great find!

 

[AgX]

I would have placed that logo in the 70's !

 

[blockend]

Lancasters? I don't recall anything like a "large, flat, box type camera" in Roy Conyers Nesbit's book Eyes of the RAF. Were you very young when you saw a Lancaster being loaded?

Is this sarcasm or are you going to contribute to the topic? I'm sure we're fascinated to know your expertise in aerial reconnaissance devices employed by the allied forces, but this is about the origins of a 1950s studio camera.

 

[blockend]

https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co8210180/polyfoto-camera-plate-camera

http://www.photodetective.co.uk/Polyfoto.html


I was not even able to count correctly above...
The "48-Camera"
http://www.polyfoto.co.uk

Well spotted. It's a Kodak department store camera. The Polyphoto explains the origin of some family photographs, which were too early for photo booths, but not large enough for a studio portrait sitting. The camera looks like it was designed to be used by non-experts. An interesting gap in photo evolution is now filled!

 

[AgX]

The way you word it, it reads like being one of those many Kodak cameras offered. If that camera being of Kodak origin is right at all, to me it rather seems the camera (actually 2 models) were custom-made for Polyphoto. More so seen the several photographic inventions of their founder, including multi-image.

It is a pity that the text at the front of the 48-Camera at the Science Museum site is not readable.

Furthermore I am interested in what kind of enlarger was used.

 

[blockend]

The way you word it, it reads like being one of those many Kodak cameras offered. If that camera being of Kodak origin is right at all, to me it rather seems the camera (actually 2 models) were custom-made for Polyphoto. More so seen the several photographic inventions of their founder, including multi-image.

It is a pity that the text at the front of the 48-Camera at the Science Museum site is not readable.

Furthermore I am interested in what kind of enlarger was used.

From the information you linked to, it states the manufacturer as Kodak. In all likelihood it was an amalgamation of the Polyphoto company and Kodak optical. Department stores go back to the c19th though they proliferated in the 1930s, when this camera came into being. The one in the film looks like a post-war example based on the same principle. The camera could be used by a semi-skilled operator who could undercut traditional portraitists. I have a vague memory of such a device being employed for shots with Father Christmas, and certainly recall seeing the photographs which matched the format of those in the film.

Department stores offered holidays to haircuts in addition to retail items. Whatever process was employed it is likely to have been quick, with plate holders and dark tanks based on the same system. The shots look like contact prints.

 

[benjiboy]

It's a Polyphoto camera, unfortunately, I"m old enough to remember having my portraits taken on one at a local department store ( some of which I still have ) when I was about twelve.
http://www.polyfoto.co.uk/

 

[Dan Fromm]

Is this sarcasm or are you going to contribute to the topic? I'm sure we're fascinated to know your expertise in aerial reconnaissance devices employed by the allied forces, but this is about the origins of a 1950s studio camera.

No sarcasm. During WWII the RAF's big aerial cameras had enormous roll film backs, not a flat back like y'r studio camera.

Exchange your skin for a thicker one.

 

[blockend]

Exchange your skin for a thicker one.

Manners maketh man.

 

[CMoore]

How long did they continue to use a device like that, that used "Glass Plates".?
That video ...linked by AgX... from Pathe was in the 1950's.?

 

[choiliefan]

You boys are fighting and falling over each other, vying to be noticed by Sabrina.