Can Anyone ID this TV?

[David Roper]

Oh is that what he meant...

[Indian Head]

Thanks for all the great responses guys! It's fascinating when finding these slides to engage in this kind of detective work. Sometimes, certain elements of these image remain a mystery.

For you Robert, here is the image in a stereo pair! When we post these on our facebook dedicated to vintage stereo slides, they are posted for BOTH cross-eye (denoted with an X) viewing, and for parallel (P) viewing. Most people can free-view one or the other, but if not, the parallel pair can be used with readily available viewing aides, such as lorgnette glasses. When looking at these in a good viewer, the image is so clear, one feels like they are bridging the gap between years, and could almost reach into the past!

In addition to collecting vintage stereo slides, I continue to shoot in stereo. And like Robert, I use Stereo Realist cameras. I have two f3.5 cameras and one f2.8 model. My favorite, and best performing model, remains the most basic (and oldest) 3.5 version given to me by a kindly neighbor in 1998. Our wedding in 2004 was shot with that camera and remains our favorite record of the event.

It's good to hear of others still using the Stereo Realist. I'll stop using it when slide film is no longer made. The David White company also made a stereo projector for the slides, as did other companies. We have a TDC Stereo Vivid projector. All used polarized light and required a silver screen. The resulting image is as good as the 3-D people see in movies these days.

[earlyfilm]

Originally Posted by Indian Head

here is the image in a stereo pair!rd of the event.

Wow!!!! I was really impressed by the deep view! It really brought the picture alive.

Is the slide dated on the cardboard?

Just wondering what brand of film was used?

I eyeballed this photo to have been taken sometime between 1953 and 1969 and during this date range there were two basic families of color slide film marketed in the US.

The most common family of film was Kodachrome K1, or K2 and Dynacolor, but the colors simply do not look correct for this type of film.

The other family of emulsions were Anscochrome, Ektachrome, Agfachrome, Ferrianachrome and Perutz, all of which would have faded much more than your slide shows.

I was impressed that someone made a track board for the Lionel train from two probable waste scraps of thick plywood that were perfectly joined cross grain.

Something in this picture, and I cannot pin what it is, just did not look right for the US, and I'm wondering if this was taken by a military family living overseas.

James

[Indian Head]

James, the slide is dated to 1954 by handwriting on the mount, and it is definitely Kodachrome. The color palette may have been slightly altered in the scanning and posting process, but it is likely Type A (or equivalent) Kodachrome from that time. With some of those other brands of faded slide film, I have found it possible to digitally restore a great deal of the color. Not to "Kodachrome good" but very acceptable. However, I have a bunch that are practically all orange! Haven't attempted to do anything with those yet.

The oddest thing I noticed about it is a bare tile floor in what appears to be the living room, but with three young boys, that might not be such a bad idea. No other information on the slide mount suggests that it was taken outside of the US, but that is an interesting thought, and I'm glad you are enjoying it. Just out of curiosity, how are you able to view it best? Cross-eyed or parallel?

[Robert Grant]

Originally Posted by Indian Head

Thanks for all the great responses guys! It's fascinating when finding these slides to engage in this kind of detective work. Sometimes, certain elements of these image remain a mystery.

For you Robert, here is the image in a stereo pair! When we post these on our facebook dedicated to vintage stereo slides, they are posted for BOTH cross-eye (denoted with an X) viewing, and for parallel (P) viewing. Most people can free-view one or the other, but if not, the parallel pair can be used with readily available viewing aides, such as lorgnette glasses. When looking at these in a good viewer, the image is so clear, one feels like they are bridging the gap between years, and could almost reach into the past!

In addition to collecting vintage stereo slides, I continue to shoot in stereo. And like Robert, I use Stereo Realist cameras. I have two f3.5 cameras and one f2.8 model. My favorite, and best performing model, remains the most basic (and oldest) 3.5 version given to me by a kindly neighbor in 1998. Our wedding in 2004 was shot with that camera and remains our favorite record of the event.

It's good to hear of others still using the Stereo Realist. I'll stop using it when slide film is no longer made. The David White company also made a stereo projector for the slides, as did other companies. We have a TDC Stereo Vivid projector. All used polarized light and required a silver screen. The resulting image is as good as the 3-D people see in movies these days.

Absolutely beautiful, and thanks for posting (by the way, that Telefunken GF6400, s/n 34592, has all fresh tubes, except the 6BQ6 is down to about 4000 micromhos, LOL)

The picture was almost certainly lit by on-camera flash, to Type A Kodachrome would been unlikely. It may have been daylight Kodachrome with blue flashbulbs, or Type F Kodachrome with clear flashbulbs. Type F was not on the market for very long. It provided the greatest flash range in its day, and could be used in daylight with a filter that looked tan in color. It was balanced for clear flash - between regular photoflood light (Type A) and daylight.

[earlyfilm]

Re: "The color palette may have been slightly altered in the scanning and posting process"

OK, I had assumed the color errors were from image fading and you had to use excessive color correction to recover the color.

If you see the Kodachrome greens blending into the copy blues, then there is one thing that may help this.

The Green layer in the older Kodachrome is rather transparent to ultra violet light and since human eyes cannot see it, this causes no problem in projection, or viewing. However, with most color camera films, ultra violet light exposes the blue layer. Some digital cameras do the same. I'd suggest that you try a Wratten 2B filter over your light source, which usually reduces the green portions of the image shifting towards blue in the copy. (A skylight filter won't work. It is not sharp cutting enough.)

Re: "bare tile floor"

In 1954 in the rural south, the po' folks had wooden floors, the slightly better off had linoleum floors, and the middle class had 9 inch asbestos floor tiles in the kitchen, only. Carpet was only for the rich folks!

Re: Viewing method

As soon as I spotted the image, and before I read your post, I opened the images and quickly crossed my eyes and spent about 30 seconds trying to figure what the difference was between the two pair. I finally realized what you had done, when I noticed the reflection off the curved TV screen was in front of the TV on the bottom picture, when it should have been inside! My brain had automatically fixed the reversed images everywhere else and I had not noticed it. However, I think I'll make two resized prints and mount them on a card for my Keystone Stereo Viewer because I like the shot!

[old_tv_nut]

Thanks for the great post. I can free-view cross-eyed on either of my monitors, but just barely do parallel, and only on the one that displays them smallest. You really made my day since this is the first time I've tried free-viewing since getting the second cataract removed.

I also guessed Kodachrome based on the contrast and color saturation.

[Indian Head]

Glad the stereo (slide ) continues to draw interest.

There really is no "color error" in this slide. I strive to make the images on the monitor look as closely as possible to how they look in the Realist viewer using a halogen bulb. The halogen gives a whiter light than the older type flashlight bulb does, and produces a better overall spectrum. Among the members of my FB Vintage Stereo Slides group are people very experienced with Kodachrome and I've gotten no complaints yet! I use an Epson scanner, so even if I felt I needed to, it is not possible to change light sources, and I can always "filter" in post if needed.

However, I also continue to make film dupes of selected slides, totally analog on a Beseler Dual-Mode Slide Duplicator, and when the filtration is dialed in just right for Kodak EDupe film (I still have a core of it left), the dupes are all but identical to the originals. The Schneider APO copy lens doesn't hurt either. Again, I defer to people who have more experience than I do; one friend, who has been shooting slides since the 1950s, and whose collection includes the slide I posted here, kept asking when viewing my dupes, "And you're saying these are NOT the originals...?" My copy work, either digital or analog, is done to high standards---mine!

In 1954, Kodachrome was available only in "daylight" and "Type A," so, without additional information, it's anyone's guess as to what is used here. Of course, both clear and blue bulbs were available (I have a stash of the clear ones as seen in my new avatar), and companies did make filter sets for the dual-lensed stereo cameras. If one knew better the time of day a slide was exposed, and there was a clear view of a window, one might better determine such technical details by examining the quality of sunlight. But there would be so many variables as to make that merely a slightly more educated guess.

Producing stereo view cards with these digitized pairs is very easy with a freeware program called STEREO PHOTO MAKER http://stereo.jpn.org/eng/stphmkr/. There is even a template to produce the cards by placing the images precisely and allowing text, background colors, etc. In fact, I just had some printed up today. They look great!

[Dave S]

Originally Posted by old_tv_nut

Thanks for the great post. I can free-view cross-eyed on either of my monitors, but just barely do parallel, and only on the one that displays them smallest. You really made my day since this is the first time I've tried free-viewing since getting the second cataract removed.

I too get a great deal of enjoyment from stereo viewing, much more than I ever did when I was younger since there was about fifteen years between getting both eyes done where I had no depth perception!

Originally Posted by earlyfilm

If you see the Kodachrome greens blending into the copy blues, then there is one thing that may help this.

The Green layer in the older Kodachrome is rather transparent to ultra violet light and since human eyes cannot see it, this causes no problem in projection, or viewing. However, with most color camera films, ultra violet light exposes the blue layer. Some digital cameras do the same. I'd suggest that you try a Wratten 2B filter over your light source, which usually reduces the green portions of the image shifting towards blue in the copy. (A skylight filter won't work. It is not sharp cutting enough.)

Thank you so much for sharing that tidbit. I did not know this and would never have figured it out myself.

I continue to be awed at the variety and quality of expertise here.

[wa2ise]

At a "Symposium for Image Display" show a few years ago I saw an attendee that had a pair of identical digital cameras mounted side by side and their shutter buttons wired together so he could take 3D pictures of various 3D displays in various company show booths. Digital 3D images. This should be fairly easy to do by people on this forum, the hardest part is disassembling the cameras without something irreversibly coming apart...

[Indian Head]

The majority of stereo photographers have switched over to digital (just as the majority of planar photographers have), often with twin camera rigs they have tethered together themselves, or from companies such as RBT. Fujifilm has already put out two digital stereo cameras, the W1 and the W3. Not sure what happened to the W2.

A few of us stubbornly cling to our trusty Stereo Realist cameras, not only out of nostalgia, but in my case, I've yet to see a convenient digital viewing system which offers the "you are there" impact as a good slide in a lighted viewer does.

Now if and when I ever get a 3-D TV or projector...

[KentTeffeteller]

Funny thing here, is one of the gentlemen behind View Productions in Knoxville, Tennessee is a friend of mine and an experienced Stereo photographer.

[Indian Head]

Kent, that is very interesting. I'm assuming you're referring to Michael Kaplan? The idea of architectural photography in stereo is a natural, and their are offerings look wonderful!

There is a stereo photographer, Jack Laxer, who began shooting architecture in 3-D in Southern California for architectural firms specializing in "Googie" architecture. About 12 years ago, some friends of mine projected a special program of his vintage slides, and I occasionally hint to them that he should put out a book, but now, I'm thinking that View-Master reels such as your friend offers would be ideal!

Here is an example of Jack Laxer's 1950s work, presented for cross-eye stereo viewing.