Mackenstein jumelle cameras

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Advertisement in Le Photo-Revue Belge, 1902 scan by Romuald Swieconek (Image rights)

The Paris firm of Établissements Mackenstein made both mono and stereo jumelle cameras in several plate sizes, from shortly before the turn of the 20th century. They are typical jumelle cameras, of good quality. They are wooden-bodied, with leather covering. They were supplied with good quality lenses (see the examples cited below). They have a fairly simple guillotine shutters, behind the lens, with several (typically five) instantaneous speeds, plus 'B' ('Pose'), with the speed control and shutter-cocking knob on the lens board. Focusing is by rack and pinion, with a focusing knob on the right of the body, which winds the lens board out from the body. There is a metal focus scale attached to the top of the lens board.

There is a folding Newton finder on top of the camera. The exact style of this varies in the examples seen. Some of the cameras also have a spirit level. They have tripod bushes for horizontal and vertical orientation.

The plates are held in an interchangeable magazine back, typically for a twelve plate load, with an exposure counter.

The Jumelle Réduite (French: 'reduced' jumelle; presumably in the sense 'compact') was made from about 1895, in sizes for 6.5x9 cm, 8x9 cm and 9x12 cm plates. The lens board allows front rise (and shift, according to the advertisement shown here, though this cannot easily be seen in the example linked).

The Jumelle Stéreo-panoramique, of the same date, was made for 6x13 cm or 8x18 cm plates. There is an external rod linkage on the lens board, connecting the aperture controls of the two lenses. In addition to front rise, the lens board also slides sideways, not for perspective control, but to allow one of the lenses to be placed centrally, for panoramic photographs using the whole stereo plate. For such use, the septum dividing the camera inside would be removed (shown in the advertisement illustrated). It is also possible, simply by capping one of the lenses, to make separate mono exposures on each half of the plate.

An example seen at Westlicht has two viewfinder pointers (in front of the finder glass, as illustrated in the advertisement); one for stereo and another for panoramic use. In another example in the larger size, the finder, with the pointer behind the glass, is mounted on a track on the body and can slide sideways, presumably to position it for separate mono exposures as described above.

A curious example seen at auction is a mono 6.5x9 cm camera, disguised as a stereo one. What appears to be the right-hand lens on the board is in fact a brilliant finder, mounted sideways to allow surreptitious photographs of subjects to the side of the photographer. This camera is too well-specified to be dismissed as a novelty; its real lens is a 110 mm f/8 CZJ Anastigmat, and it has the same type of guillotine shutter as the other mono jumelles. For normal use, it also has a tubular Newton finder on the top, which folds away into the body.