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through a pair of prisms, which magnifi ed the binocular
image. The height of the images was usually limited to
three inches. Brewster exhibited the fi rst model made by
Andrew Ross at the British Association Meeting in 1849,
and suggested it should be applied to photography. It was
slow to catch on at fi rst and he struggled in vain to attract
several English opticians to manufacture the instrument.
In 1850, Brewster took his stereoscope to Paris where,
the author Abbe Moigno was very impressed by the
idea and presented it to Jules Dubosq, an optician who
suggested producing transparent pictures on glass and
replacing the solid bottom with a glass screen. At the
Great Exhibition, The Crystal Palace, 1851, a number
of stereoscopes made by Dubosq were shown as well as
a set of stereo daguerreotype. The effective illusion of
the instrument caught the attention of Queen Victoria.
This prompted Dubosq to make an elaborate stereoscope
for the Queen.
The fascination with this novel instrument soon
spread to the general public. Dubosq had many orders
and opticians in England started to manufacture ste-
reoscopes. Among the photographers who worked with
stereo daguerreotypes were Claudet, Beard, Mayall,
Kilburn and Williams. They all took pictures of the
Crystal Palace and its exhibits. One of the fi gures most
responsible for the popularity of the stereoscope and for
its scientifi c improvement was A. Claudet (1797–1867.
Claudet showed a collection of stereo daguerreotypes
at the Great Exhibition, which greatly impressed the
Queen. In 1852, Claudet published his fi rst paper on the
subject: On the Stereoscopometer and on a Manifold
Binocular Camera (British Association for the Advance-
ment of Science reports 23 no.1 1852,. 6). The stereosco-
pometer was an instrument used to measure the position
of the two cameras, relative to the subject, in order to
achieve a good stereo effect. The binocular camera was
a special camera for taking stereo daguerreotypes, which
had two lenses. Unlike many others photographers
Claudet adapted stereo daguerreotypes to portraits and
even groups with great success and achieved a very a life
like quality. Claudet’s portraits were taken with painted
backdrops, as this was thought to give the stereoscope
a more dramatic three-dimensional affect.
An example of Claudets portrait stereos is The
Geography lesson c 1853 which was referred to in the
Illustrated News as a charming part of the Gernsheim
Collection. The complex composition is made up of a
group of fi gures at differing heights, around a globe
in the centre. There is a balance of all elements of the
composition. The fi gures are lower in the foreground and
raised in the background. Claudet used this formula for
many of his elaborate stereo group portraits, which he
called his ‘conversationals.’ The depth of such a complex
portrait can only be fully appreciated when seen through
a stereoscope, where the characters are brought to life
and given three-dimensional form. Before the invention
of the binocular camera, Claudet produced his stereos
by setting up two cameras side by side, which accounts
for the exaggerated roundness of the fi gures.
In 1852 J.F. Mascher from Philadelphia invented a
miniature case which had on one side the folding stereo-
scope and on the other a stereo image. In 1853 Claudet
gave a lecture at the Society of Arts entitled ‘The History
of the Sterescope and its photographic Applications.’ For
the promotion of this area of photography he received
the Society medal from the President Prince Albert.
In March 1853 claudet patented a folding pocket
stereoscope, in which one stereoscopic daguerreotype
was fi tted in a case with two lenses. When opened it
formed a stereoscope.
A drawback of Brewster’s and Dubosq’s design was
that eye pieces were not adaptable to different eye widths
or to different sight. In 1855 Claudet patented an instru-
ment where the lens was set in adjustable tubes. This
patent also covered a large revolving stereoscope, where
one hundred slides could be rotated on a band.
In 1858 Claudet presented his stereomonoscope to the
Royal Society. The instrument combined stereo images
on a large glass screen which allowed several viewers
to watch at a time, pre-empting cinema.
Before the invention of moving image, at the begin-
ning of the nineteenth century, stereoscopy provided a
new and exciting way of seeing the world. This was an
ideal medium for travellers to present scenes of places
that most people had never seen and to re-create a visual
illusion of such scenes. The stereoscope was as com-
mon in American homes as the TV is today. People who
had never been able to travel could escape to far away
places. Stereoscopic pictures were used as travel guides
and educators. People could sit in their own homes
whilst touring the world with views of the countryside,
ancient Egypt, sights from New York or San Francisco.
Great events were brought into peoples living rooms.
Natural desasters such as the Johnstown fl ood or the
San Franscisco earthquake could be recorded for the
fi rst time. Both the Chicago Worlds Fair in 1892, and
the St Louis Worlds fair in 1904, could be enjoyed by
those who were not even there. A. Claudet described
the stereo daguerreotype:
The general panorama of the world. It introduces to
us scenes known only from the imperfect relations of
travellers, it leads us to the ruins of antique architecture,
illustrating the historical records of former and lost civili-
sations; the genious, taste and power of past ages with
which we have become as familiarised as if we had visited
them. (‘Photography in its Relation to the Fine Arts,’ The
Photographic Journal, vol. Vi, 15 June 1860)
The invention of the stereoscope marked an important
step towards the invention of moving image and for
many years Dubosq, Claudet and other pioneers worked