#stereoscope

x

I loved that View-Master paid artists to create these 3D dioramas for their reels, instead of using stills from the animated films. I'd spend hours just looking at these pictures, which were even better with the stereoscopic 3D effect.

Back in February, I mentioned at a virtual American Girl Book Club meeting (hosted by a Facebook Group) that someday I wanted to get Samantha’s Stereoscope because my mother had one when I was growing up and I remembered thinking it was so cool. A friend from the Group said that she had one, but I told her I doubted I could afford to buy it from her based on the prices I’d seen online. A few days later she reached out and said that she’d be happy to just give it to me, since it would have personal meaning to me (she didn’t even ask me to pay shipping)! I gave it to Sam for her birthday this year and told my mother about the act of generosity. Recently, my mother found her own stereoscope and lent it to me so I could take photos to share with all my dolly friends! It is missing a couple pieces (there was a handle at one point, you can still see where it’s broken off) and I had to experiment a bit to find where exactly to hold the slides in order to see them properly… but once I figured it out, WOW! I couldn’t stop staring at the various scenes. It’s really deeply impressive for such simple technology, and I can easily see how people in the Edwardian era might have been mesmerized; I have a smartphone, a computer, and infinite television and movies at my fingertips, and I was pretty addicted.

Inka Essenhigh, Blue Field, 2021, Enamel on canvas, 32 x 80 inches (81.3 x 203.2 cm)

Internet Archive

stereoscopic daguerreotype