These stereo images are presented for parallel viewing with your handheld device. To view cross-eyed stereo pairs, click here.
The photographer Charles Swedlund, my college professor and mentor, was making great stereo photographs in the 1970’s. In 2005, my wife Robyn and I visited the Maryhill Museum in Goldendale, WA where we saw their exhibition of Theatre Du Monde. We purchased a souvenir set of stereo photographs from the exhibit, and when we looked at them later, I thought of Charles Swedlund and his beautiful photographs.
I began to learn about the history of 3-D imagery and decided to make a camera that would allow me to see the entire image circles produced by each of the two lenses. I used an old 120 roll-film panoramic torpedo camera back with two 20mm Nikkor lenses, with two slip-on lens caps as shutters. These stereo photographs were made in the West Duwamish Greenbelt and Pigeon Point Park, just a short walk from our home in West Seattle.
My first version of the stereo camera used a pair of circular lens hoods and a tandem-mounted pair of discs which fit inside of the two lens hoods to serve as a manual shutter with low-ISO 120 roll film. However, I was concerned that the two lens hoods might have been cropping the images from the lenses into circles, which I did not want.
The second version of my stereo camera used the same pair of 20mm lenses, but without lens hoods, and with a tandem pair of slip-on rubber lens caps which I could gently remove and replace for the exposures. I was glad to find that the 60mm wide 120 film was recording the entire image circles from the lenses, without being cropped by the circular lens hoods.
My favorite method for viewing these stereo photographs is with a Fairchild F-71 tabletop stereo viewer and 13×19-inch prints of each pair. The Fairchild viewer was used during WWII to view stereo aerial reconnaissance photographs.
I have gathered 12 vintage Fairchild F-71 stereo viewers in preparation for an exhibition of my stereo photographs. Anyone interested in a demonstration, or in purchasing a set of ten 13×19-inch archival stereo prints with a Fairchild F-71 viewer, is invited to send an email to ford@fordgilbreath.com.
