Re: [photo-3d] LEEP camera

[Project3D@xxxxxxx]

In a message dated 09/12/00 15:42:46 GMT Standard Time, Ralph Johnston/Linda 
Sherman (copley@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx) wrote:

<< I believe that Ed Shaw is currently holding Paul Wing's LEEP camera.  He
 was able to repair it so it takes photos again.>>

Actually, _I_ repaired Paul's camera, and Ed Shaw and I used the camera 
across Europe and at the ISU congress in Lindau... 

<< I have looked at the slides a number of times in the LEEP viewer and am 
always awestruck by the immersion.  You can't turn your eyes away from the 
image, it is that large and close to you.  Don't try to look at the slides 
with another viewer,
 they look highly distorted at the edges.  They are not even rectangular.
 This is corrected by the viewer optics.>>

Well, I too have examined a number of LEEP images, but I have short-sight and 
my glasses get in the way of using the viewer properly, and the viewer 
doesn't quite have enough accommodation for me... I'd say that image quality 
is _almost_ acceptable...
 
<< Neither Ed or Paul are photo-3d members, but you can contact Ed at
 ebshaw@xxxxxxx  Paul doesn't do e-mail. >>

I'm not sure if that e-mail address still works for Ed, now he's retired. 
Paul has an account on AOL (I think - it might be Compuserve!) I _think_ it's 
Wing3D@xxxxxxxx
 
<< I heard a rumor that some spare parts were obtained from the principals
 which might be enough to make one or more cameras.>>

I think that's just a rumour... Though I know of one little cache of parts 
amounting to one "almost-camera" with non-working electronics. :-(
 
As far as I can tell, there is Paul's camera and one in Hawaii that has 
worked at one time. Don't know the exact location or if it's still working. 
Then there's the non-working camera. That makes three. The total possible 
production is thought to be seven...

So don't even _think_ of trying to buy one of these babies! Rare as hen's 
teeth.

For what it's worth, Werner Weiser produced a very useful book giving three 
views of the stereo cameras produced in the post war period, together with 
the demographics for the cameras. The second edition has the LEEP listed, 
based on information and pictures from Paul Wing. 

In Leiden, at the ISU congress, I took a picture of a group of British 
Stereoscopic Society committee members, and instantly was approached by Dr 
Weiser (who must have sprinted several hundred yards to get there so 
quickly!) with the words "I am a collectoa, and I have never seen one of 
those!"

Bob Aldridge