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WWII Photos of Barrage Balloons
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 6:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi! This is off topic and if you feel it inappropriate let me know and I'll desist. I was hoping some of you could view a few of my scans and let me know if

1. They were taken with a Graflex
2. If the quality is too bad to salvage them
3. Anything I should ask my 85 year old Father-in-Law about them when he visits this weekend. He's travelling 3000 miles so we don't get to see him much; just talk on the phone. It's hard to get this type of info on the phone.

I am clueless but get a strong feeling that they really matter and need to somehow be saved.
*EDIT*
*I posted my home page which is the same as my e-mail and that is where the spam-bots are getting it I think!* Deleted! Sorry for the inconvenience. So much for that!*
Sorry to be such a P.I.T.A. *

I would appreciate any input on this matter!

Thanks Again!

[ This Message was edited by: simplify on 2004-08-23 03:08 ]
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t.r.sanford



Joined: 10 Nov 2003
Posts: 812
Location: East Coast (Long Island)

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 7:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't think the photos were taken with a 4x5 "Speed Graphic," because of the aspect ratio. My guess would be a 35mm. camera, but it might have been anything -- I don't know that they weren't made with a miniature "Speed" on 2¼x3¼ film.

A Signal Corps battalion would have had "Speed Graphics" available, but your prints look as though they were taken by an individual for his own use, perhaps with his own camera, of a small group of comrades. The troopers appear to be in a landing craft, but it's hard to make out the details.

The prints look pretty good to me, and I think could be scanned and cleaned up with very satisfactory results.

Indeed, there is a barrage balloon in one of the photos. Barrage balloons are now one with Yesterday's Seven Thousand Years, unfortunately -- a balloon barrage might be a worthwhile protection against suicide attacks by terrorist hijackers, if you used heavy enough cables to deal with today's very strong airframes.
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RichS



Joined: 18 Oct 2001
Posts: 1468
Location: South of Rochester, NY

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 7:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I agree with TR. Aspect ratio and lack of fine detail in the distance really looks like a 35mm camera. Nice pics!

My 83 year old father used a 35mm Argus "brick" for some shots in the Pacific back in WWII. Unfortunately(?) I only have some negatives though. Most of his pics were lost through the years...
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Rangemaster



Joined: 06 Jul 2001
Posts: 412
Location: Montana, Glacier National Park

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 9:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

They look a lot like the 6cm x 9cm stuff I have seen...as far as clean up, they look like they would be pretty good..

Dave

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Rangemaster



Joined: 06 Jul 2001
Posts: 412
Location: Montana, Glacier National Park

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 9:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

If these were scanned at lifesize of what the negative was, they are 6cm x 9cm if you save them and check in a photo program they come out at 9.49cm x 6.35cm at 72 d.p.i. which would put them in the 6cm x 9 cm area...they are 3.736 Inches X 2.5 Inches...

Dave

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t.r.sanford



Joined: 10 Nov 2003
Posts: 812
Location: East Coast (Long Island)

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Perhaps Simplify can enlighten us about the origin and history of the prints.

The Anglo-American 2¼x3¼ in. format, as represented by 120 rollfilm making 8 exposures, really is 2¼x3¼ ins., as I recall. I haven't seen a Anglo-German 6.5x6-cm. (2½x3½ in.) negative, but its long dimension still would be shorter than the measured size of the scans.

The 120 negative has a 9:13 aspect ratio; the 2½x3½ negative would be 5:7.

Your measurement of the scan suggests something close to 2:3, i.e. either an enlargement of a 35mm. negative to wallet size, or a reduction of an old 3½x5¼ "postcard" negative (as produced on 122 film by a "3A Graflex" reflex or a Kodak "3A Autographic"). I think 35mm. more likely.
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So, what does that mean? It could have been a Graflex? The actual scans I posted; I think are contact sheets as the ships hull numbers and other text was backwards. I had to do the flip in Photoshop. As I made my way through the album, I saw duplicates of the same photos only processed correctly with white borders as opposed to black. Also, B&W as opposed to the sepia color. I'm not sure this would be a clue but I thought I'd add that in as a bit of trivial guessing from the clueless! At any rate; scanning at 2400 dpi crashes my Photoshop program if I go 720dpi I can get decent 5x7's. I may just do them all at 900dpi to give us a nice 8x10 duplicate. I'd love to get a story or two and make my husband an album for a holiday gift. Pictures along with a little story about his Dad. The album is done is German with a Schwaztika (sp?) on the front and lots of photos of Hitler and his men inside. My Father-in-Law "picked it up" while he was in Europe, so he told me when he gave me the album! He is a piece of work!

These are prints. We do not have negatives.
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Rangemaster



Joined: 06 Jul 2001
Posts: 412
Location: Montana, Glacier National Park

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Are we sure these weren't taken with one of the old Kodak formats, I just received an order for glass that matches the dimentions of these pictures...perhaps one of the German Kodaks...

Dave

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t.r.sanford



Joined: 10 Nov 2003
Posts: 812
Location: East Coast (Long Island)

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Can you measure the exact size of the prints you have? That the frame numbers are flopped suggests that the negs were oriented wrongly when printed; you can do this with an enlarger or when printing by contact, of course, but I agree with you that the visibility of things outside the frame does make contact printing a more likely technique.

If no frame number is higher than 8, and if the prints measure 2¼x3¼ ins., then the film probably was 120. If no frame number is higher than 12, and the prints are just a tad larger than 2¼x3¼ ins., then they may well have been made from filmpack negatives.

In either case, a "miniature Speed" could have been used to make them; we have no way of knowing. Both film types were popular, and many cameras were available to use them.

("Swastika")
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

We're not SURE of anything! I got the video camera out while his wife was still living and asked him. It made him cry! ;( So .... not sure what to do this visit! ;( She's gone and he's so lonesome without her! I don't dare make him cry AGAIN!

He did mention that he got the photos when he got back to New Jersey. An Army buddy of his was a photographer and gave him a set of prints. He "taped them"! ugh! in this German album "he picked up" while he was over there.
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The small one appears to be: 2 & 1/8 x 3 & 1/8

The large one appears to be: 2 & 3/8 x 3 & 7/8 (these are all trimmed pretty tight on one side where no black is showing)

Does this make sense?
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

ps: I did scan them at 100% at 2400 dpi. Photoshop did not like it so I dropped down to 720. I think I'll start over and do them at 900 - 100% to give us a nice 8x10 or whatever the nearest ratio is with no cropping.
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t.r.sanford



Joined: 10 Nov 2003
Posts: 812
Location: East Coast (Long Island)

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Your new "Anniversary Speed Graphics" should be fine conversation pieces, and perhaps will enable you to lead the conversation, by gradual steps, to the album and its contents.

Your father-in-law may remember what the camera looked like -- perhaps not in detail (though you may be surprised!), but sufficiently to suggest to you whether it was a folding rollfilm camera (of which there were hundreds), or something like a small press camera (or it close relative, the "double extension" camera famed in the '20s and '30s, like a Kodak "Recomar"), or a 35mm. camera...
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Simplify



Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 43

PostPosted: Tue Jul 27, 2004 11:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah, he was born in 1919 and he has already given me the camera HIS Father bought on the year of his birth! A Kodak Autograph with pen still attached! The "glue" did not treat the view finder well! So ... I'll probably just proudly display it on the mantel with some of the photos taken with it! Although if I could find a restorer, I wouldn't mind running a roll of 120 through her!

I am so hoping to take HIS portrait with my new speed! I have been studying Rembrandt lighting and hope I can nail it while he's here! That would certainly be a wonderful opening for a conversation on cameras! He's such a wonderful man. He's really been an asset to our family, our country and our world. Funny, he originated in Poland/Russia (he's not sure because he says they just kept moving the border! ) and wound up in America is the US Army fighting ..... well ..... you know ..... Ironic!
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Nick



Joined: 16 Oct 2002
Posts: 494

PostPosted: Wed Jul 28, 2004 1:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:

On 2004-07-27 15:55, Simplify wrote:

The large one appears to be: 2 & 3/8 x 3 & 7/8 (these are all trimmed pretty tight on one side where no black is showing)



I wonder if this is 116. 116 or 616 film is 70mm wide. That's 2 3/4" but some of that would be border.

http://www.fact-index.com/f/fi/film_format.html

claims 2 1/2" wide.

If it's contact printed then it's possible the person just used the paper he had on hand.
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