World Stereoscopy Day: Close Six-String Encounters in the Third Dimension

World Stereoscopy Day, founded by the Brian May Archive of Stereoscopy, occurs on June 21 each year, the anniversary of Sir Charles Wheatstone's presentation on Stereoscopy to the Royal Society in 1838. This is my fifth year participating.

The idea for this year's World Stereoscopy Day project developed in my brain last winter after I had my Ventura guitar renovated and took some gorgeous close-up pictures of it.  One of my previous efforts for Stereoscopy Day was inspired by the same guitars. Go figure. Interplanetary dust or hedgehogs would be a tough assignment for pinhole.

One of the critical parameters of stereo photography is the baseline between the optical centers of the images. Because it mimics the separation of human eyes, 60mm is the most commonly used. But for some things, like comets and extreme close-ups, you may have to use a longer or shorter baseline.

I have seen references in the past that the minimum distance that the brain will allow the merger is 30 times the baseline. This is probably about as reliable as much common wisdom on the internet. My experience suggests that you can get away with much closer subjects, particularly with wide-angle cameras, which are unheard of in lensed stereo photography, but are de rigeur in the pinhole community.

Using 6x6cm negatives, obviously you can't have a two-chamber camera with a less than 60mm baseline.

Using the Cha-Cha method, moving a single camera between images, you can make the baseline anything you want.  I've successfully done this both for macro and narrow-angle-distant applications. My close-up experience was with 24x36mm negatives, with a 10mm baseline and 100mm distance. From those guitar images that inspired this project, I knew that was about where I wanted to put the camera.

I chose The Little Mutant at moderate wide-angle 45mm, 68-degree angle of view, more to make it easier to control the background than for any stereo or pinhole convention.

In the previous experiments, I just used a ruler to slide a desktop tripod the right distance between exposures, but since have since gotten a K&J travel tripod which came with a measuring scale on the quick-release clamp. I can't think of any other use than stereoscopy for this to be there. Moving the camera precisely and winding the film was easy. Pro tip: Don't kick the tripod or subject between exposures.

There's a lot of discussion about the goal to be able to comfortably view a stereograph. These might take a little concentration, but once locked into 3D, I can hold them without strain. Remember you have to focus back and forth to look at near and far parts of the image.

There are three common ways to view stereographs. In line here, they will be set up for Crossed Eye Viewing, which needs no additional equipment. Crossing your eyes makes a double image. When you make the two inner images overlap in the middle, and focus on some element in the scene, it pops into three dimensions. Here's a link to an exercise that might help to learn this. 

Also displayed here are red/blue anaglyphs, which, of course, you need appropriate glasses for (see my profile picture). I'm really no expert at this, and in a few of these I wasn't able to get them aligned to eliminate ghosting, especially on the closest elements. I may have discovered the secret of that 1:30 distance ratio.

For Parallel Viewing or printing for a classic Holmes Stereo Viewer, click here for a PDF.

The inspiration for this all was my shiny, renovated, lawsuit-era Ventura clone of a relatively rare Gibson L6S. One improvement was to replace the chrome tuners that weren't working great with new black ones. I cut the Japanese character Kuro out of matte vinyl for a headstock ornament, which is just barely visible.

All the replacements for the original tuners, whether black or chrome, had economy somewhere in the description. Luthier Matt Hayes modified the head for some name-brand Kluson machines.

The chrome-covered pickups had a slightly dented surface that bothered me and didn't sound all that great. You can really tell where the cloners saved the money to sell inexpensive guitars. Those got replaced by Seymour Duncan Black Winter Blackened Matte Black humbuckers, which sound really cool. The neck was straightened and completely refretted. I've gotten up to that 20th fret with the dot jamming in Hortonville.

The tailpiece stop bar and Tune-o-Matic bridge are indistinguishable from their Gibson counterparts and remain as the legacy of the craftspeople at the Kaman Industries factory in Japan. I suppose they already had the machining done for the expensive guitars, so just used the same parts.

The original electronics remain in the guitar. It sounds great, but YouTube makes me think they may need an upgrade. With the six-way pickup selector, it's hard to tell what's supposed to be controlling things.

My original antifascist machine from the late sixties - another clone of a Gibson, this time of a Hummingbird, by Alvarez, another American brand made in a Japanese factory.

An authentic Warlock from the original American company - an NJ (Nagoya Japan) Series with its optional, distinctive Widow headstock. This one was made in a Korean factory, though.

Classically outfitted for metal dives with a locking Floyd Rose Bridge, although I never use the whammy bar.

A pick-holder mini-clone of a Marshall amplifier with my classic, made-in-California Fender Telecaster, and my latest favorite Fender product, the Mojo Grip. The recent controversy of Fender's venture into the lawsuit business against high-end strat-style makers reminds me of AT&T, when they realized that Bell Labs and market-leading network technologies weren't as profitable as paying legislators to prevent competition by public research universities. Fender made some legendary guitars under some of the brand's business plans.

The Little Mutant has two hand-drilled .27mm pinholes on the axis and 13mm above it, 45mm from a 6x6cm frame. The film is Kentmere 400 semistand developed in Rodinal 1:100.

Gloria in excelsis pinhole.

I've recently been involved in a few workshops and an interview where the question "Why pinhole?" was discussed. The answer always boils down to some version of "Can you believe these photographs were done with something I made with my bare hands on my kitchen table with tools and materials you can find around most homes? Just an empty box with a little hole in it? On film I developed at home?" It never gets old.

Thanks again to Rebecca, Denis and Brian for putting on the World Stereoscopy Day party.