Chapter XII

Photographic and Projecting Apparatus

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∣📄 p.161 In the discussion of the cost levels and possible applications of microcopying in the preceding chapter, allusion was made from time to time to specific makes of apparatus, either already on the market or under development. These must now be compared from the standpoint of initial cost and working efficiency. The microcopying cameras here compared and noted are the following:

Class I. Cameras designed to serve for pictorial photography, but adapted to use in document copying.

1. Cinescopie (Belgium).
2. E.K.A. camera, with Lemare accessories (used by Library of Congress in copying foreign archives).
3. Leica camera, with Leica accessories (used by many American scholars).
4. Contax camera, with Zeiss accessories (a later product than Leica, but similar in many respects).
5. Argus camera, an American camera resembling the Leica (front lens required).
6. Bantam kodak, an Eastman, quantity production, low-price camera.

Class II. Cameras designed primarily for document copying.

1. Ansco Universal copying camera.
2. Ludwig camera, made to order (used at Yale University Library, New York Public Library).
3. Filmograph (not on the market as apparatus).
4. Draeger camera (used at U. S. Bureau of Agriculture for Bibliofilm
5. service)
6. Commercial Recordak (used in copying the NRA and AAA records).
7. Newspaper Recordak (sole installation at Rochester). ∥
8. Eastman bound—volume copying camera, 16mm. film (in process of development).
9. Eastman bound—volume copying camera for newspapers, 35mm. film.
10. Kennedy camera (made to order).
11. Folmer Graflex photocopying camera (in course of development).
12. Matson camera (built for Edwards Brothers, Ann Arbor).

The Camera and the Use of Film

These cameras differ greatly in respect of their use of film. One distinction lies between the use of the long and short roll. All the cameras of the first class take a short roll of film (three to ten feet); all the cameras of the second class, except the Ansco, take a long roll of film (100 feet or more). The Leitz Company has made an intermediate camera that takes thirty-three feet of film. Advantage lies with the cameras that will take rolls of 100 feet or more, because film strips of that length can take advantage of low processing costs, due to the development of machinery for the motion picture industry.

Another distinction lies between the fixed and variable frames. All the cameras of the first class have a fixed frame size for each exposure; some of the cameras in the second class have variable frame sizes. The variable frame is an advantage because it permits the more economical adaptation of film to copy.

Some of the cameras of the second class carry the principle of variability to the point where they can use either 16mm. or 35mm. film. The Draeger camera can even be adapted to the use of 70mm. film, and the Folmer Graflex machine to the use of paper. The more variation that is possible in the copying machine, the more closely film and copy can be adapted to each other.

Two of the cameras, the E.K.A. and ∣📄 p.162 the Filmograph, use an unperforated film; some of the others use film that is perforated on one side only; others use film with perforations on both sides. The unperforated film yields a larger film area for the same price as perforated film, but misses the economies that can come from low processing costs in processing machinery that requires perforations. The film perforated on both sides can be adapted to use in a larger number of projectors and to processing in a larger number of processing machines, but it is least economical in the use of the film area. Some large-scale processing machines will not print copies from a double-frame negative; they will work only with single-frame negatives. The machines that use film perforated on one side only compromise between the desirability of devoting as little film as necessary to perforations, and the need for adaptation to moving picture machinery in processing. The characteristics of the different cameras in this respect are noted on the chart.

Another camera quality that affects the use of film is the optical system. In many cases, this is a matter of lens efficiency. The problem has been discussed in the chapter above on resolving power. Since a lens can often be purchased separately from the camera, and the resolving power of the lens reaches a maximum with the more expensive lenses, the lens might be considered separately from the camera, except for those cases in which the two are sold without the possibility of substitution. The Recordak cameras differ from all others in that they use a slit rather than a full lens.

One feature of the lens or focusing system is not unlike the control of film areas in its relation to the full use of film area. This is the ability to vary the reduction ratio. Two of the Recordak cameras work with a fixed reduction ratio and fixed focus.

A related element of structure in the camera is its adaptation to copying areas of different size. Some camera equipment, notably the E.K.A. camera with Lemare Ampligraph equipment, does not easily lend itself to taking full newspaper pages. This is indeed a matter that may be controlled by the mounting of the camera rather than by the camera itself, but the ∥ mounting is an integral part of a well-designed copying equipment.

The Camera and the Mechanics of Operation

These cameras differ in the degree to which their operation is automatic, and hence in the labor costs of photography to which they give rise.

In general the cameras of the first class are the least automatic, and the automatic document copying features appear in the cameras of the second class only.

The features affecting labor costs of copying are the following:

(a) devices for holding copy in place; (b) devices for focusing; (c) devices for making exposures; (d) devices for moving film; (e) devices for controlling relation of light to exposure.

The Recordak cameras can be provided with automatic light control; the Draeger and Folmer Graflex cameras have automatic focusing; the Ludwig camera has no automatic features. Sometimes the automatic features involve hand work, in other cases there is a motor attachment. These features of automatic operation are designated in the chart.

Another quality is portability, often found inversely related to automatic efficiency.

The complete equipment for microcopying is often made up of so many different parts, or subject to such variations in assembly, that the chart above does not render a full account of the qualities of each machine. The machines are, therefore, listed here in order, with more complete descriptions.

Cinescopie and Photoscopie

A Belgium company began operations in the 1920’s, with a catalogue list of “Film ‘microphote’ de la Photoscopie,” as a cheap but efficient substitute for glass slides used in art study and visual education. It issued a catalogue of geographic, religious, scientific, and artistic subjects, and sought to interest the historical associations and library associations of Europe in its use as a preserver of pictorial and documentary material. The Photoscopie has its offices at 121 Rue Berkmans, Brussels; a similar enterprise, the Cinescopie, is located at 29 Rue aux Laines, Brussels. Cinescopie, like ∣📄 p.163

∣📄 p.164 Photoscopie, issues a general catalogue of film subjects in all fields. The specifications of the Cinescopie camera are interesting. The machine is small: 9½ x 4½ x 6cm. The shutter makes automatically measured exposures up to one second, which is not sufficient for document copying. The actual film carrier takes a length of three meters of standard 35mm. film, which means 120 pictures. The film must be loaded in the dark. A “holder containing more film is contemplated for those who wish to take as many as 500 or more views on a single film. The camera can be fastened to any photo stand.” The projector goes with the camera, can be fastened to a camera stand, and can project downward onto a table. The camera is the most portable of all; it is the only one that can really be carried in the pocket.

The Cinescopie suffers by comparison with the Leica or Contax camera because of the low resolving power of the lens. But the lens is satisfactory for making reductions of ten diameters from ordinary book type. The frame of exposure, while fixed, is smaller than the exposure frame of the Leica and Contax cameras, and therefore permits the copying of more pages per foot of film. The same observation applies to the Eastman Kodak Company’s “Bantam,” $10.50 including supplementary lens, and the Argus camera, $12.00 without supplementary lens.

For certain kinds of work, notably the copying of whole newspaper pages, the Cinescopie, Bantam and Argus would be unsatisfactory because of its low efficiency optical system. But in the ordinary copying of books, this is not a disadvantage; the purchaser of the Leica or Contax cameras should be warned that he is buying photographic power that the fixed frame of the film will not permit him to use anyway in the copying of book pages of average typography and size. A principal disadvantage of the Cinescopie as an aid to the American scholar is the absence of a commercial organization in America to take care of sales. The Bantam and Argus have sales organization, but no equipment to adapt to document copying.

The E.K.A. Camera and Lemare Ampligraph

The camera used by the Library of Congress in copying foreign documents from ∥ the archives was of French make, an E.K.A. camera manufactured by Krause of Paris, with accessories manufactured by Paul Lemare, 73 Rue Fondary, Paris, XVI.

In 1930 the E.K.A. camera and stand were quoted at 3,250 francs, and the manuscript box at 511 francs, the lights at 3500 francs, not including cost of packing and shipping.

The camera uses a sixteen and one-half foot length of unperforated 35mm. film, taking 100 exposures on a loading. It must be loaded in the dark. The dimensions of the exposure frame are the largest of any used in microcopying: 30mm. x 45mm. This use of unperforated film lowers the cost per square foot of photosensitive surfact, but the large exposure frame cancels some of this advantage by using more surface than would be necessary with a maximum reduction ratio. The unperforated film limits processing possibilities also. While the E.K.A. camera is theoretically perfectly adapted to the copying of newspapers, the Ampligraph stand that Lemare makes for it does not give sufficient height or area for this work.

Leica and Contax Equipment

The most widely used camera for document copying is neither the Belgian Cinescopie nor the French E.K.A., but the German Leica. It is a multiple purpose camera, a piece of precision mechanism, for which innumerable attachments and accessories are available. Experiments in newspaper copying with the Leica were made with this camera in 1926 at the Hoover War Library at Stanford University; the camera used by Dr. Bendikson for microcopying at the Huntington Library at San Marino, California, is the Leica; Professor Krisopp Lake of Harvard University has used a Leica extensively in photographing manuscripts in the Near Hast; Professor James A. Barnes at Temple University is another pioneer. The equipment has become almost a standard implement in research work.

After the Leica camera had made a market, the Zeiss Contax camera appeared as a competitor. It resembles the Leica in its precision and its long catalogue of accessories. These catalogues are so extensive that the scholar may well ask for a Baedeker to guide him through them. The following paragraphs are written as an ∣📄 p.165

∥ attempt at such a guide, with equipment designated by number and code word. The differences between the Zeiss and the Leica equipment are not significant in respect of adaptation to document copying. Both cameras used a five-foot roll of 35mm. film perforated on both sides. Both have loading magazines which can be loaded with film in the dark and inserted in the camera by daylight. Neither will serve as a document copying camera until it has been supplemented with certain accessories. ∥

(a) The Lens and Camera

The earlier models of the Leica, notably Models A and B, did not have detachable lens mounts. They are no longer advertised in the catalogues, and are available mostly in the second-hand market at a price of about $40.00. The normal equipment for both cameras is a 50mm. f 3.5 lens; the Leica lens goes under the trade name of Elmar, the Contax under the trade name Tessar. This standard lens, sold separately from the camera, is priced:

The cameras, with these lenses, are priced as follows:

∣📄 p.166 The Leica Model FF with magazine holding thirty-three feet of film sells for $195.00 without lens, or $244.50 with lens.

In order to equip these cameras for document photography, it is necessary either to have a supplementary lens that will focus at the necessary short distances, or to have an attachment that will remove the regular lens to a greater than normal distance from the camera.

The supplementary lenses are sold at the following prices:

Contax (Zeiss) Proxar supplementary lenses, corresponding to the above Leitz supplementary lenses, are listed but not priced in the catalogue material.

The Contax catalogue also refers to three Delta lenses, which are sold at $7.50 the set (#5520); these seem to correspond to the Leica front lenses in copying work.

With these supplementary lenses, the camera can be brought near enough to a page to make the page fill the whole frame of the film. The reduction ratio involved in the use of Front Lens No. 1 in copying a normal spread of two book pages with the Leica is a little more than eight diameters. In copying ordinary books, this reduction ratio, or something near it, is the only one that is possible because of the fixed frame size of the exposure area on the film. It must be noted that much of the high optical quality of the Leica and Contax cameras and lenses goes to waste in copying ordinary books because of the large fixed frame of the film, which does not suit reductions of ordinary pages to the high ratios that the resolving power of lens and film would otherwise make possible.

The alternative to the use of front lens equipment is the use of an extension tube, which is screwed into the lens mount. The extension tube, by increasing the distance between lens and film, makes it possible to bring the camera nearer to the object that is being copied, and hence to cover the full frame of the film with the image of a smaller object than the normal mechanics of the camera would permit. If ∥ the extension tube is used, however, the photographer must have a special device for checking the accuracy of his focusing. When the front lens is used, he can measure the distance from camera to object and focus the lens on a calibrated scale; when an extension tube is used, he must be able to focus directly on ground class. There is no technical reason for this, for the Leitz Company might prepare scales that would permit measured focusing with each of the extension tubes. But in the absence of such scales, the use of the extension tube is tied with the use of “sliding focusing copying attachment,” Model I or Model II.

The sliding focusing copying attachment is a device in which the lens is mounted in a holder that carries a ground glass at exactly the film distance from the lens. The camera, loaded with film, can be slipped away from the lens without spoiling the film; the focus can then be adjusted by watching the ground glass.

Then the camera can be slipped back into place and the picture taken. The difference between Model I (57,600 FULDY), which sells for $24.75, and Model II (57,610 FULET), which sells for $13.50, is that the more expensive model lets the camera slide back and forth in front of the lens in grooves, while the Model II makes it necessary for the operator to remove the camera and lay it down on the table while focusing on the ground glass.

The Contax camera uses another device to secure the same result, for the Contax, unlike the Leica, has a removable back. The camera is unloaded, a piece of ground glass fitted in the place of the film, the focusing adjusted, and the camera reloaded. The ground glass focusing system of the Contax is much less convenient than that of the Leica because of the necessity of unloading the camera for each focusing operation. The ground glass focusing screen sells for $4.50 (#5520).

∣📄 p.167 With the camera adapted for ground glass focusing, the extension tube principle can be applied. The Leica extension tubes are priced as follows:

Either of these extension tubes will be sufficient for all ordinary document copying, but a tube that will permit the photographing of even smaller areas is the 3cm. tube, which sells for $2.10.

A study of the Zeiss catalogue does not show any attachment corresponding exactly to the Leitz extension tubes. Apparently the Delta lenses take the place of extension tube equipment. Therefore, the inconvenience of ground glass focusing with the Contax can be avoided, since the camera with the front lenses can be brought into focus at measured distances over measured areas by consulting a table.

To summarize: in order to adapt the camera for document copying, the photographer needs as a minimum, (a) Leica: either front lens ($6.50), or extension tube and sliding focusing copying attachment ($1.20 plus $13.50; total, $14.50); (b) Contax: three Delta lenses ($7.50).

The camera is now adapted to document copying from the optical standpoint. It remains to prepare a stand that will hold it in position. Here again a number of alternatives present themselves, but the minimal equipment is a sliding arm that will hold the camera and slide up and down on a rod.

The Leica sliding arm (57,620 VEARM) sells for $10.50; the corresponding Contax item is called a “reproduction bracket” (#995/32) and is priced at $27.00. The Contax bracket includes an attachment that is very useful, namely, a steel tape attached to the bracket to make measurement of distance from camera to baseboard a simple operation. Note that the greater convenience in measured distance focusing with the Contax bracket contrasts to the ∥ greater convenience in ground glass focus-— ing with the Leica attachments.

The photographer now has his camera fixed to a bracket, but the bracket must be mounted on an upright rod, and the upright rod, attached to some kind of a base before he can begin work. The Leitz Company sells for $103.50 a “universal reproduction device” of basic equipment, which consists of baseboard, upright pillar, sliding arm, and steel tape measure. This equipment includes a special type of sliding arm that is especially convenient in using the ground glass focusing attachment. But the essentials are the pillar and the baseboard. Bought separately, the collapsible upright pillar (57,524 ZSLOO) costs $31.50, the baseboard (VAFOO) has no separate price listed in the catalogue. The combination pillar and baseboard in the Contax catalogue is listed at $12.00 (#1454/28).

The Leitz Company also offers a highly portable apparatus that will serve for taking ordinary book pictures, the name is “collapsible table reproduction device” (57,679 OOZIS), and it costs $35.00. There should be a quotation for a non-collapsible upright pillar in the 1935 Leica catalogue but the writer does not find it; in 1933 ; the 100cm. metal pillar was quoted at $8.00 (35,463 VERYN).

But the photographer can take leave of the catalogue and its prices when he has the sliding arm or bracket, for the baseboard is nothing but a board, and the pillar nothing but a column which can be made from any ordinary steel tubing, fitted to a flange and screwed to a board base. The writer made one for $1.50, and many scholars have built the mountings for their Leica cameras in various designs.

To summarize, the following minimum investment is required in setting up Leica or Contax document copying equipment:

∣📄 p.168

It remains to set up the lighting system. The lighting fixtures included in the Leica and Contax catalogues are not photographically superior to those that can be rigged from materials purchasable at the hardware store. Ordinary lighting fixtures with electric cords and plugs provide the source of illumination, and a system of reflectors must be used.

The account here made of the lighting problem is applicable to any installation. If it is desired to hold down the pages that are to be copied by means of a glass plate laid on them, the lights must be set far enough to the side so that they do not reflect from the glass into the lens. This side illumination requires more light than vertical illumination. Most ordinary lighting fixtures concentrate the light in spots; to distribute it evenly over the material to be copied is a principal objective of the photographer. This can be done by using reflectors with non-parabolic curves, and by diffusing the light through semi-transparent tissues such as tracing cloth or lens paper. The diffusion screen absorbs a large amount of light, and, therefore, makes necessary higher power lights or longer exposure time than would otherwise be called for.

The purchaser of photographic equipment will find opportunity in the Leica or Contax catalogue to invest a small fortune, but the minimum essentials are those set forth above.

The Argus

A camera and projector combination that deserves close watching is the Argus, manufactured by the International Radio Corporation of Ann Arbor Michigan. The camera resembles the Leica in many respects, but sells for $12.50. At the time of writing the tests of the camera for document copying had not been made, but the manufacturers are considering an adaptation to document copying. There is also a projector, that is priced at $25.00, and this may be developed by means of supplementary ∥ attachments into a reading machine.

The Argus camera will never develop the automatic features proposed in the Draeger or the Folmer Graflex; it probably will not attain the optical efficiency of the Leica or Contax. But it may well turn out to be the American substitute for Leica and Contax, for it is going on the market at the low prices that quantity production permits.

Ansco Universal Still-Film Copying Camera

The cheapest of the many cameras designed specifically for document copying is the Ansco Universal Still-Film copying camera, which sells for $50.00 including camera mount. The lens is mounted on a frame facing a vertical copy board which can be clamped in position at any distance up to three feet from the lens. The copy board will hold a sheet 11″ x 14″, which is the largest size that can be photographed conveniently with this apparatus. The frame of film exposed is just half the size of the Leica or Contax area; it is a single frame camera, whereas the Leica and Contax are double frame cameras. This smaller area of film should call for higher optical efficiency in the lens, but in fact the lens system is much less efficient. Nevertheless, two pages of a book in large print, or one page of a book in small print, can be copied with this camera.

The focusing is done in a way that suggests the sliding focusing copying attachment of the Leica camera. The lens is fastened to a board, behind which two chambers can be moved. One chamber contains the film, the other is backed with ground glass. The chamber with the ground glass is placed behind the lens, and the copy is brought into focus. Then the film chamber is moved behind the lens and the film exposed. There is no shutter on the lens. The exposure is made by removing a lens cap.

The principal deficiencies of the apparatus, apart from the low quality of the lens, are the absence of any device to ∣📄 p.169 let the photographer know when he has used up his roll of film and the vertical position of the copy stand. The film loadings are very short–only three feet. A loading is fitted into a small wooden box, the box slipped into place in the film chamber, and a piece of the film drawn over some sprocket wheels. It is difficult but not impossible to reload the film magazine from a long roll of raw film. The film loadings, including the wooden magazine, are sold by the Ansco Company for $.50; they contain only $.06 worth of film. The film is moved by a downward pressure of the hand over the sprocket wheels. But there is no signal to let the operator know when he has used up his three feet of film.

Moreover, the holding of copy is very difficult. A book refuses to stand up with flat open pages, and even separate documents are not easily clamped in place. There are some good ideas in the design, but the equipment is certainly not suited to the needs of anyone who has more than an occasional document to copy.

The Ludwig Camera

The photographer of Yale University Library, Mr. Frederick Ludwig, has designed a camera based on the lens system and frame size of the Leica, but capable of holding a longer roll of film. His apparatus is a wooden camera, with a detachable lens, and a unique focusing system. The wide aperture of the 50mm. f 3.5 lens admits so much light that the ordinary process film acts like a piece of ground glass in focusing. There is a tube through which the operator can look at the back of the film while focusing. The frame used for this purpose is spoiled, but the convenience of focusing is so great that the loss of material can be ignored. The film is turned by hand; the exposure can be made with a shutter mount or by removing a lens cap from the lens. The focusing is quickly done, but it is often not accurate enough to take full advantage of the efficiency of the lens. This makes little difference in copying ordinary book pages, because the large frame size of the camera exposure calls only for reductions of the range of ten diameters.

Mr. Ludwig has built a number of these cameras to order. They are the ∥ least expensive of the document cameras that take the 100 foot roll of film ($50.00 for the camera without the lens; $15.00 for the stand and bracket).

One of these cameras is installed in the New York Public Library, another was bought by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace for copying Peace Conference documents, another is in use in Spain for copying documents that are studied at New Haven by Professor Rose of the Yale faculty.

The Matson Camera

Edwards Brothers of Ann Arbor arranged for the construction of a special document copying camera. Their designer, Mr. Robert Matson, started with a motion picture camera and adapted it to document photography. It has the smaller frame of exposure, thus permitting higher reduction ratios in book copying. It also has some automatic features, notably a foot pedal that makes the exposure and turns the film.

Consumers Research, Inc., made another document copying camera from a mo- tion picture camera. Cameras adapted from motion picture apparatus start with the smaller frame size, the longer roll of film, and the rudiments of an automatic exposure system. In this respect, they are more promising than the Leica as the basic design for a document copying camera.

The Filmograph and Kennedy Cameras

Mr. H. C. Lambach of Seattle and Mr. Lloyd B. Kennedy of Warren, Ohio entered upon microcopying as a means of setting up the records of title abstract companies. They worked independently of each other into this field in the 1920’s and 1930’s, and each designed his own microcopying apparatus. In both cases, the automatic principle was carried forward to a high degree of perfection.

The Kennedy camera takes a long roll of film—1000 feet—but, of course, any part of it can be cut off and developed when exposed. The shutter and ratchet to turn the film are operated by a motor. The ratchet can be set to move the film any chosen distance for each exposure, and windows of varying sizes can be fitted in front of the film to vary the area of exposure. A variable frame necessitates the use of a lens large enough to cover ∣📄 p.170 the largest frame, hence a loss in resolving power. Hither perforated or unperforated film can be used. In building a new camera, Mr. Kennedy would equip it to take either 16mm. or 35mm. film.

The lighting system is wired to a rheostat and voltmeter to stabilize the light intensity. In focusing, Mr. Kennedy makes a test strip to find the best chemical (as distinguished from visible or optical) focus, and then hooks his lens mount in the correct position. The focusing is more accurate but also more troublesome than with the Ludwig or Leica cameras.

The most interesting part of the Kennedy machine is the automatic device by which the exposure is made and the film turned by pressing a glass plate down on the page to be copied. An electric circuit, made and broken by contacts on the wooden frame that holds the glass, opens and closes the shutter, moves the film, and then rings a bell to tell the operator that the exposure is made and he can turn another page.

Mr. Kennedy counts on a speed of 5,000 exposures (10,000 pages) per day. He will manufacture this machine to order for a price somewhere near $300.00 and design into it such features as the purchaser may desire. The Filmograph equipment is not on the market.

The Draeger Camera

The Filmograph and Kennedy cameras were designed for use in copying title documents for abstract companies; the Draeger camera was designed for copying library material and research documents.

The Draeger camera is used in the Bibliofilm Service of the Library of the Department of Agriculture, and is installed in the Library of Congress. It takes 16m. and 65mm. film, and can use a special 7Omm. magazine. The lens is £:6.3; the frame of the film is variable, ranging from ½″ to 1½″ along the length of the film; the film roll is 500 or 1000 feet; the operation is entirely automatic, only the turning of the book pages being required of the operator.

There is a prospect that the camera will be manufactured to order for libraries that intend to use it for developing a microcopying service. Dr. Draeger ∥

is interested in developing the design of the camera to meet the needs of scholars.

The Folmer Graflex Camera

Mr. Edson S. Hineline, engineer of the Folmer Graflex Corporation, is working out a camera which will have extraordinary utility. The camera, now in the course of development, is expected to take, through interchangeable magazines, any one of four types of sensitized material: strips of paper 7Omm. wide; 35mm. double-perforated film; 16mm. film perforated on one side; and 70mm. film with double perforation. The Factograph paper and the film strips will be loaded in 100-foot lengths. The possibility is anticipated of either loading film purchased in bulk in a dark room, or of loading specially prepared rolls of film in daylight.

With the 35mm. film, it will be possible to make not only the conventional double frame full-size exposure, but a single frame exposure one-half the customary size. This will permit conforming to the principle of maximum utilization of area without sacrificing simplicity and uniformity in projection and reading.

The camera will be provided with a ∣📄 p.[170a]

∣📄p.[170b] (blank)

∣📄 p.171 self-supporting stand, consisting of a sturdy separable upright column attached to the base. When the base is closed, it becomes the case for carrying the camera and its accessories. The case will be approximately 11″ x 17″ x 6″.

The illumination will be provided by photo flood lamps supported from the main column in such a manner as to permit movement and adjustment to any conceivable location. The photo flood lamps will be connected with the resistor, which provides reduced intensity in the illumination except during the brief interval required for the exposure. This will not only prolong the life of the lamp, but will reduce possibility of eyestrain on the part of the operator.

The shutter can be set to predetermined exposure time within a broad range. The entire operation of the outfit after placing the book in proper position will be automatically governed by air pressure emanating from a foot treadle which will turn on the lights to full photo flood intensity, advance the film, and make the exposure of pre-determined duration. This will leave both hands free for the manipulation of the materials to be copied. A book cradle, which will be available as an accessory, will serve to keep the materials to be copied in the plane of focus through upward pressure against a plate glass.

The value of the machine as a device for copying documents and books results from the fact that it is designed for this specific purpose, and does not sacrifice this purpose to others, such as landscapes and art photography. Just as a Leica camera will do a great many things in pictorial photography, but only a few in document photography, so this camera has a marvelous elasticity in meeting the problems of reproducing research materials, but will not do landscape or art work.

If the scholar wants the cheapest possible paper copies, he can get them directly by loading the camera with Factograph paper (not indirectly, as in the Leica system, by photographing on film and enlarging). If he has a series of short items to be copied and filed separately, he can take them on paper or film cut into short lengths. If he has a long series to copy, he can take it on long rolls, ∥ like those that are made with the Recordak machine.

The development of this machine will be watched with special interest by scholars, because this camera is being designed for prospective quantity production and sales at a price that will attract individual buyers. The other automatic cameras are being developed more for the use of libraries with microcopying services. The price of this camera cannot be announced as yet, and the design is not finally established. It is hoped, however, that it will be adaptable to copying for any projection equipment, that the price will be something near the level of a typewriter, and that it may become for the next generation of scholars as indispensable as the typewriter.

The Recordak Bound-Book Copying Camera

The Eastman Kodak Company is developing a camera for copying bound materials. While it is still in an unfinished stage, some details of the new camera are known. The camera will be movable but, to quote Eastman, “it would hardly be called portable.” There are two models, one for 16mm. film and another for 35mm. film. This film will be taken in 100-foot rolls. The lens used will be an Anastigmatic one with f:4.5 opening. Books up to 12″ x 16″ and up to 5″ thick can be copied. The machine is designed to be almost entirely automatic. It will be motor driven and a touch of a button will automatically bring down the glass cover, insuring the material to be copied being under the focal plane. The same touch will light the lights for illumination, make the exposure, advance the exact amount of film required for the next exposure, and finally raise the glass cover so that the book is free for the next page to be turned. An automatic device will take care of raising the book to compensate for the decreasing thickness of the book as pages are turned.

For setting up the machine to copy a book, a light is projected through the film aperture onto the book, throwing a square or oblong form of light onto the page to show exactly how much of the page is being covered at that particular degree of reduction and setting the aperture diaphragm. The camera is then raised or lowered so that the width of this light ∣📄 p.172

exactly takes in the width of the printed matter to be copied. When this is set, the diaphragm of the aperture is adjusted so that the length of light fits the length of the material. This setting of the aperture diaphragm automatically sets the advancing mechanism of the film, so that just the right amount of the film to cover this space is advanced after every exposure is made.

The Recordak Camera

The original development of the Recordak equipment was in the field of microcopying unbound documents. The machine was first designed for use in banks in the copying of checks; then its use was extended to the copying of other documents, such as charge slips in department stores. The first large-scale use of it for scholarly purposes was the copying of the AAA and NRA hearings.

The machine is about the size of a small typewriter desk. It is foolproof, not only in operation, but also in processing, for the Recordak Corporation combines the sale of its processing service with the sale of film. The loose sheets are ∥ fed into a roller, which carries them through the photographic field. They are photographed while in motion, the light reflected from the paper passing through a slit to a moving roll of film.

The Recordak machines are fixed focus machines. One model is set to make reductions of (sixteen diameters, another of seventeen, a third of eighteen and one-half, and the highest of twenty-three diameters. The twenty-three diameter reduction is satisfactory for good typescript copy, but not for six-point type.

The machines are leased, not sold. The lease price is $35.00 a month for a year’s rental, $50.00 for shorter periods. The processing price and the price of convenient reels and boxes for film storage are included in the price of the film—$5.50 for a 200-foot roll. These models all use 16mm. film perforated on one side.

The Newspaper Recordak

The newspaper Recordak machine is simply a machine of similar design to the commercial Recordak which will take a larger Sheet of paper on its roller and photograph it on 35mm. film. The reduction ratio is sixteen diameters. Only unbound newspapers can be photographed. The newspaper Recordak is not available for use except at Rochester, consequently the files of newspapers are shipped to Rochester for copying. If the scale of business should warrant it, the machine could probably be supplied to institutions for lease or purchase.

Projector Reading Machines

In Chapter XI, the problem of the design of the projector was analyzed for its bearing on reduction ratio and standardization. In this chapter, the approach will be somewhat different. Each make of projector will be examined from the standpoint of reading convenience, and the optimal quality of each will be regarded as only one of a number of important qualities.

The projector is related to the microcopy in three ways: first, it must enlarge the microcopy to legible size; second, it must conform mechanically to the width and perforation of film; third, it must adapt itself to the length of the film roll.

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projectors. The first consists of those that are essentially of the “magic lantern” type, intended for displaying pictures on a screen, and that are adaptable to the reading of films. The most important of these are the products of the Spencer Lens Company (the Delineascope), the Bausch and Lomb Company (the Balopticon), and the E. Leitz Company. All of them throw the image against a screen, from which the reader reads by reflected light. None of them offers high convenience in loading the film or in moving it from page to page while reading. Mr. Lloyd B. Kennedy has a reading machine that reflects the image from two mirrors successively, thus bringing it close to the reader’s eye.

The second family is the reading machine type, developed for the specific purpose of reading film. All of these machines meet in one way or another the special problem of loading the film for reading. They fall into two main classes: those that project the image on a ground glass screen, so that the reader is confronted with transmitted light; and those that project on a reflecting screen, so that the reader encounters reflected light. The writer’s experiments, and the observations of others, have induced a belief that the transmitted light is more fatiguing than the reflected light. According to Mr. Verneur Pratt of International Filmbook Corporation, this generalization is not true, but is the result of the use of the wrong translucent screens.

The third family of combination is the combination camera and projector.

Another type of combination is found in the union of an enlarging with a projecting device. A projector that throws a right image through a translucent screen will not serve for an enlarger, because sensitive paper laid on such a screen will develop a mirror image. The projectors that throw the image on a screen for reflection to the eye can be converted into enlargers by excluding all light from the screen except the light that comes through the lens.

The chart of projectors shows the qualities of each in these respects, as well as their optical qualities and film adaptability.

The development of the reading ma∥ chines is moving so rapidly that anything written at this moment will probably be out of date in a few months. The prospective purchaser of equipment should make inquiries of the following firms before making a decision:

Recordak Corporation
550 Madison Avenue
New York, New York

International Filmbook Corporation
Rockefeller Center
New York, New York

Spencer Lens Company
Buffalo, New York

Bausch and Lomb Company
Rochester, New York

Folmer Graflex Corporation (for combination camera and projector)
Rochester, New York

Dr. R.H. Draeger (U.S. Navy)
Care of Bibliofilm Service
Department of Agriculture Library
Washington, D.C.

With the reservation that all information here given should be checked against the developments of the next few months, there are a number of points of practical comparison between the different makes of projectors now being designed or manufactured.

The best established projectors are those of the magic lantern type, for their manufacture has been launched for other purposes than reading. All of them have the weakness that they are primarily adapted to a longer distance projecting than is convenient in reading. The Bausch and Lomb Balopticon and the Spencer Lens Delineascope take perforated film; the Leica projectors take unperforated. The Balopticon and Delineascope are more easily loaded than the Leica, for they receive the film from the side, while the Leica receives it from the end.

Neither the Balopticon nor the Delineascope is equipped with lenses that equal the 50mm. f:3.5 Leica camera lens, which can be mounted on a Leica projector. If a film copy of a newspaper page reduced ∣📄 p.174 eighteen diameters is projected on a screen, only about one-third of one-half of the area will be delineated clearly. If the center is brought into focus, the edges will blur; if the text at the edge is brought into focus, the center will blur. Since the entire page area is illuminated, but only a part of it brought into focus, there is a certain wastage of light.

The first of the specialized reading machines were those developed by Filmograph and Kennedy. Filmograph worked out a method of mounting projectors of the magic lantern type several feet above the heads of the readers and controlling the movement of the film by means of a long belt. This device must have meant difficulty in loading. Kennedy set the projector near the reader’s hand and then placed a mirror about three feet from the projector to reflect the image back to a second mirror and thence to a screen. Both the devices thus got the necessary distance for projection.

The first of the Recordak reading machines used the principle of the mirror and ground glass, resembling in this respect the Kennedy apparatus. Later they were shifted to the principle that had been used in the Filmograph—the image was projected downward on a reflecting surface —and the movement of the film strip in front of the lens was controlled by a wheel set conveniently near the right hand of the reader.

The design of the International Filmbook apparatus is still undetermined in many respects. Its primary quality at the moment is a device for foolproof loading from a special cartridge, and a provision for the movement of the film to avoid abrasion. It will use the translucent screen for a reading surface.

Because Kennedy and Filmograph were exposing a large area of film, i.e., had a large aperture, they needed a long distance to get their projected image in focus. The Recordak, with a film area only about 16mm. x 20mm., could use a cheaper lens, shorter distance, and less light with the same result in legibility. The International Filmbook equipment seems to be carrying the principle of small aperture further than it is carried by the Recordak.

When the newspaper Recordak was developed, to read a newspaper page 18″ x ∥ 22″ on a double frame of 35mm. film, the problem of projection resembled that which Kennedy and Filmograph had met by providing a long distance between lens and screen. The Recordak technicians met this problem ingeniously by retaining substantially the same optical system that had been worked out for the small Recordak, and exposing only one-fourth of the newspaper filmslide to the light. Since the reader cannot cover with his eye at a reading distance more than one-fourth of a newsprint page, it was a happy idea to project only a part of the full page at a time. A lever within easy range of the left hand moves the film in front of the lens, thus bringing the different parts of the page successively into view.

A problem in all projectors is the ability to turn the film through ninety degrees, or to manage in some way to read microcopies which have lines running across the film strip and also those with lines running parallel to the film strip. Dr. Draeger has been most successful in solving this problem. The Recordak library projector has hardly met it at all. The International Filmbook Corporation has given it full attention. In the projectors of the magic lantern type, this problem is easily met by turning the film holder through ninety degrees.

Another unsolved problem in projector reading machines is that of shifting from small aperture-high enlargement to large aperture-low enlargement by changing lenses and condensers. Of course, a projector of the magic lantern type will give enlargements in any required degree, but only at the sacrifice of intensity of illumination. A projector to meet all purposes would be one which could be fitted with a lens and condenser that would magnify a double frame 35mm. film by ten diameters, and then by some simple shift could be changed to magnify a single frame 16mm. film by twenty-five diameters. Such a projector would read any microcopies now being made. The International Filmbook Projector is to have a turret of three lenses, and a slide with two condensers, to serve this variability.

The Recordak, and presumably the International Filmbook, Draeger, and Folmer Graflex projectors, will be provided with ∣📄 p.[174a]

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either 16mm. or 35mm. film; but none of them will permit a shift in aperture and enlargement ratio.

Another key problem in the design of projectors is the ease of loading and place finding. The tendency of design in place. finding—which is important for long runs—is to introduce some kind of calibration which permits the reader to turn quickly to the desired place in the roll of film. The corresponding requirement for short runs is ease and rapidity of loading. The best apparatus from this standpoint would be one which could be loaded, either with a reel or a short strip of film, from the sitting reading position, without stretching the arm upward or outward. If loading could be made as easy as turning the pages of a book, the use of short-run film copies would be greatly facilitated.

While these observations are in some respect inconclusive, they do support the conclusion that the problems of design in reading machines are rapidly finding solution.

Projector-and-Enlargement Equipment

The combination of projector reading with enlarging machinery has already been noted as a possibility, and the possible development of low cost levels in ∥ making enlargements on paper from film has been mentioned. Dr. Draeger is designing an automatic enlarger that should give speeds of 5,000 to 10,000 pages a day. The essentials of such an enlarger are merely the automatic stepping of the film in front of the lens, the automatic control of light and exposure time, and efficient devices for paper holding.

Dr. Vernon D. Tate, of the National Archives, is working out another important part of the program of microcopying development. He is interested in the standardizing of instructions covering light intensities, exposure times, and processing. The conditions under which document copying takes place are subject. to a far higher degree of standardization than those under which pictorial photography is carried on. The object photographed is a black and white, the light is usually artificial, and the range of distances and reduction ratios is small as compared with those encountered in general photographic practices. The emphasis in the technique is definitely placed on fineness of grain and high contrast. If the average research worker can be trained to be his own photographer, and to make enlargements from his own microcopy films, the resulting release from burdensome mechanical work in the collecting and organizing of material should have a marked effect on intellectual standards in research. ∣📄 p.176