Mars Camera
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| Mars Camera 1893 image by Ron (Netherlands) (Image rights) |
The Mars camera is a detective camera made in mahogany by Emil Wünsche of Dresden from 1889 to 1893. It contains twelve 9x12cm plates. It has a brass bound 130mm f/8 Aplanat lens, with three apertures in a rotating disc,[1] and rotary shutter, operated by pull-strings.
The Mars is a magazine camera: the plates, in metal holders, are stored in the back part of the camera body, under spring pressure (there is a pull-string to relieve this pressure while changing the plate).[1] The wooden part projecting on top of the camera is a plate-changer. After each exposure, the camera can be turned upside-down, and the holder with the exposed plate falls into the wooden changer. Then the changer is shifted to the back of the body, where the exposed plate falls back into the plate magazine when the camera is turned right-side up again. the changer is then used to move a fresh plate from the magazine to the exposing position. Some examples of the Mars have a dial counter showing the number of plates exposed;[2] this was perhaps a late addition or optional feature; it is absent on the example pictured here, and the one cited at Westlicht.[1]
There are Watson finders for horizontal and vertical orientation.
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Mars Camera serial no. 6123, sold at the December 2010 Westlicht Photographica Auction in Vienna. Several excellent photographs, showing features such as the selectable aperture disc and pull-string controls.
- ↑ Mars Camera at www.photographica.nu
