Clarissa
The Clarissa is a tropical strut-folding camera for 4.5x6 cm plates, made by Ernst Lorenz of Berlin in the 1920s. The camera is horizontally oriented. The body is wooden, usually without leather covering, and the bellows is of red or brown leather. Most fittings are brass, and most examples seen also have a brass front standard.[1][2] Examples are also seen with a wooden front plate; unlike the brass front, this allows sideways lens-shift.[3]
The camera has a focal-plane shutter with speeds 1/20 - 1/1000 second;[1] there is a plate on the top, giving the shutter settings (slit width and spring tension settings) to give each speed. McKeown lists the Clarissa with either a 75 mm f/3 Meyer Trioplan,[3][4] or an f/4.5 Helioplan;[1] examples have also been seen with a Steinheil Cassar,[2][5] or an Emil Busch Glaukar Anastigmat.[6] Any of these lenses has helical focusing (in contrast to the superficially-similar Nettel and Deckrullo-Nettel cameras by Zeiss Ikon and its predecessors, which incorporate the focusing mechanism into the struts).
Most examples seen have a folding Galilean or Newton viewfinder on the top. One example shown at Westlicht also has a ground-glass screen.[5]
Lorenz's Nacht Kamera is based on the body of the Clarissa, but with a fast f/2 helical-focusing Rudolph Plasmat on a rigid lens-tube instead of the struts and bellows, and with body leather. It is often described as a copy of the Ermanox. Only three of these cameras are known to exist.
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 McKeown, James M. and Joan C. McKeown's Price Guide to Antique and Classic Cameras, 12th Edition, 2005-2006. USA, Centennial Photo Service, 2004. ISBN 0-931838-40-1 (hardcover). ISBN 0-931838-41-X (softcover). p632.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Clarissa with 7.5 cm f/3.5 Cassar and brass front, sold at the second/third Westlicht Photographica Auction, on 24 May 2003.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Clarissa with 75 mm f/3 Trioplan and wooden front plate allowing shift, sold at the 23rd Westlicht auction, on 25 May 2013.
- ↑ Clarissa with Trioplan and brass front, sold at Sale 9509 - Photographs, Magic Lanterns, Optical Toys and Cameras by Christie's, on 19 November 2002.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Clarissa with Cassar and brass front, sold at the eleventh Westlicht auction, on 26 May 2007.
- ↑ Clarissa with 7.5 cm f/3.1 Glaukar Anastigmat and brass front, sold at Sale 18999, Mechanical Music and Cameras by Bonhams, on 29 November 2011.
