Re: RE: Who invented the Cirkut camera?

[Richard Schneider <richard.schneider@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks for the information Kurt. You bring up a good point about how the history of the Cirkut Camera or Cirkut types of cameras would be incomplete by focussing only on American patents and inventions. We should try to get more input on the issue from our European colleagues and create some kind of "holistic" timeline. Perhaps at the IAPP International Convention this year a group of us could have a workshop on this subject by getting together and comparing notes. Anybody interested ?

Thanks,  Richard

>>> Kurt Mottweiler <krm@xxxxxxxx> 06/08/99 11:27AM >>>
Richard,
  I always enjoy your presentations at IAPP meetings.
Just a note on the Cirkut camera timeline. There are at least two rotating
cameras which were made to use a wet plate holder and a tambour-like or
sliding panel arrangement to cover the portions of the plate not behind the
slit at any given moment. The Johnson and Harrison Pantascopic camera
(English patent on the 5th of September, 1862) is an example. It uses a
clockwork motor and vane governor. Although it only ran through 110 degrees,
there is no reason to believe that with a shorter lens or longer plate
carrier, it could not do 360 degrees. Mechanically it is fundamentally the
same as a Cirkut camera. The Liesegang Rotations-Apparat of 1882 is similar
in arrangement but uses a hand crank to rotate it.
 And then there's the Eastman-Walker roll paper holder of 1884 for negative
paper and the subsequent Eastman's American Film which was a stripping film.
These and other roll holder inventions of the period would certainly have
provided some inspiration to any aspiring panoramic camera designers of the
period.

Kurt Mottweiler
Mottweiler Design
2 Bonito Court
Santa Fe, NM  87505
505.466.3632
krm@xxxxxxxx