P3D Book Reviews

[Ernie Rairdin <ernie@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I was looking through my son's (Craig) web page and noticed this book
review on the "The Civil War In Depth" by Zeller.  He has a lot of book
reviews, personal opinions, stereo pics (he prefers cross eye viewing)
along with 2d pics taken with his Kodak digital camera.  Some are even
interactive.  The Civil War book is the only one about stereo.  The web
site is http://www.craigr.com

This book is the first 3-D photographic history of the Civil War. This
is amazing given the sheer number of 3-D photos shot during the war,
 and the fact that most 19th century Americans had ready access to 3-D
imaging devices (stereoscopic viewers) and dozens of stereo views. Just
as we might say that today we experience the world through television,
to Americans living from 1850 to 1930, the world was experienced through
black and white pictures viewed through a stereoscopic viewer.

We perceive depth because the brain interprets images from two eyes 
about three inches apart. Relative paralax between the images is 
interpreted by the brain as depth. Early photographers realized that if 
two pictures were taken at that same distance apart, the brain would 
recombine them into one image with all the same depth cues as we have in 
real life. Stereo images are created using a camera with
two lenses, spaced about the same distance apart as human eyes. The 
resulting images can be free-viewed with training (that is, viewed 
without an artificial aid) or can be viewed using a stereoscopic viewing 
device that helps the eyes and the brain work together to recreate the 
stereo image.

Only 130 different pictures of Abraham Lincoln are known to exist 
(though there are thousands of copies of each, and millions of copies of 
one photo that became the Lincoln cent). One fourth of these images were 
originally shot in 3-D, yet this book contains many 3-D views of Lincoln 
that have never been published before.  I find this amazing.

This book is not a complete story of the war, but it is a history of the
photographers who covered the war on both sides. It is also a history of
photojournalism. It includes over 100 views of the war, many of which 
you may have seen in history books but only in two dimensions -- one or 
the other of the images was left out. The book includes a simple viewer 
that you can fold and assemble for aid in viewing the images. With 
training, however, you can see the 3-D effect without the viewer.

One note -- the image on the top of page 32 is reversed. You'll have to 
set the viewer aside and cross-eye view this one to get the effect.

Visit craigr.com for addiotional 3d views.

by:  Craig Rairdin

>From Ernie (Dad)-- I've tried to give Craig a normal stereo camera but he prefers side step with his Nikon or Kodak Digital.  If you visit his 
web site, leave him a note that you would like to see a review of "Iowa 
Stereographs", then I wouldn't have to write it.

Ernie Rairdin


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