In 2007 I left the company I had been working for 11 years. Knowing my passion for photography my friend and co-worker, Antonio Grandini, in charge of finding a farewell gift for me, passed the mission to a man called Chico Parodi. That was to find a classic camera to join my collection. Chico, nickname for Francisco in Brazil, represents the fifth generation in a family of photographers. In 1906 one of his ancestors, who had been a mariner and worked as well with machinery for coffee seeds processing, returned to Rome for a while to see his family. Over there he met Giuseppe Droghini, a photographer working for the Vaticano, and decided to become himself a photographer. He even convinced Giuseppe to come along with him to Brazil and start a promising business in Campinas region, 90km from Sao Paulo. While Giuseppe gave up some years later, Nicolau persisted in the business and built very successful firm till 1937 when he passed away. Today Chico Parodi has a workshop in Valinhos and still works creating memories for families living over there. 'we want to be part of your history' that is the workshop's slogan. That is also what they have delivered for more than one century now. To confirm, have a look at:    Foto Parodi and click on "Acervo".

Well, coming back to my farewell gift, guess what? the camera he found, not by chance, the one he went after, belonged to his grand grand father and served the Parodis for some many years. It was sold in 1955, when he retired, to another photographer in Campinas. Luckily enough,Chico could trace it back through his network in the region. Family photographers have of course huge networks.Even luckier, the camera was in excelent condition.

 

This is a picture of the founder Nicolau Parodi and his family. The boy on the right is Joao Parodi that appears on the second picture now as a young man already. He owned and used this Thornton Pickard for about 30 years.

Well, the camera is not only a camera but a complete outfit. The three original leather cases you see in the picture accommodate the camera with three filmholders, a second one is for three extra filmholders and the third keeps the tripod. By chance I had a roller-blind shutter with the right size to fit the Royal Ruby 18x24 cm. Also original Thornton Pickard. Roller blinds are actually what made the firm worldwide famous and they are not so difficult to find. There is a web page from the    Museum of Science & Industry in Manchester that tells a bit about the history of this English firm started by John Edward Thornton to which Edgar Pickard joined later in 1888.





The lens that came along with the camera doesn't fall behind it in stature. It is also made in England, by Ross in London, under licence of Zeiss from Germany. Zeiss is still today a leading company in lens and other optical instruments. To know more, go to   The Zeiss Historica Society . On the lens it is written Zeiss Convertible Anastigmat. This design is also known as Protar Series VIIa. Protar is a brand Zeiss adopted when patent expired and other manufacturers started using 'Anastigmat' and that name became like a generic for lenses having anastigmatic correction. Ross listed it from 1896 to 1900. It is a combination of two lenses fully corrected. Each one consists of 4 cemented elements. For that reason it was called convertible, meaning that these two cells could be used independent to give different focal lengths: 19 1/4 inches (aprox 480mm) or 23 1/2 inches (aprox 587 mm) and the combination makes it a 12"or 300 mm that is the normal lens for a 18x24 cm frame. Aperture is f 12.5 when any of the single cells is used alone and f7 when in combination. I cut a brass lensboard and made some fixing brass parts in a way that I can use it also in a Linhof Technika 13x18 cm. To know more about this lens go to:    Ross Protar

Camera and lens were in production about the turn of the century. Not knowing the exact year I decided to thing I have a beautiful photo gear from 1900 with a beautiful story. More than having or owning I feel now responsible for keeping it in its excellent shape and productive, oh yes...taking pictures, for some more decades.





About the construction it is a field camera. That means something the photographer should be able to carry along for assignments far from the studio. The whole set in the upper picture (without glass plates that was still in use) weights about 22 kilograms or 48 pounds. Nevertheless it is easily recognizable the efforts paid into the design to make it as light as possible with the available material and requested specifications. It is only wood and brass and every part has a role in structuring the body to make it firm and stable.



Considering that the belows can be extended up to 70 cm when the lens board is all the way forward and the film plate all the way backwards. Considering as well that the lenses at that time would go easily up to 2 kg or more (this Protar has 930g). The problem of allowing lens and film movements for composition but holding both still and free from vibration at picture taking moment (or minutes) was really a 'tour de force'.



For understanding why so many knobs, sliding rules and rack and pinion dispositives, we must remember that one feature very important at that time, was the possibility to move the lens in relation to the film. In this front view we can see two knobs that will slide the lens board up and down and right and left. Also tilting movements can be used in both film and lens. The reason for that traces back to renaissance. When perspective was developed we learnt to see vertical lines vertical. For instance, the columns in a drawing or painting do not converge to a vanish point. We learnt to feel confortable with that view of reality. When Photography was introduced, cameras had to be able to represent architecture the way Brunelleschi would do it himself.

 



Above you have a drawing from Brunelleschi (the centre nave in St. Lorenzo - early 15th century) and a church from the Parodi's photo collection, maybe taken with this Thornton Pickard. We don't experiment any strangeness feeling looking at them due to the fact that vertical lines are parallel. That is how we are used to see representation of architecture since the early renaissance.

Below you have a picture taken with a digital camera (without lens/back movements) aimed at the center of the construction. That is the Santa Efigenia church downtown Sao Paulo. The vertical lines converge to a vanish point up in the sky. We learnt to read images that way too, without strangeness. That would look too much amateur and ugly some decades ago. Going further, some artists even adopted the "new way" and their rendering of architecture makes them look like snapshots. That is the case of the image below on the right side.(credit: this drawing I got from the web site FundaŤ‹o FAPERJ - Igreja de Santa Tereza de Jesus)

 

There is no right or wrong way, this is all convention. Anyway the point is that, the camera is sort of complex, in order to comply with the conventions at its time. To take photos with renaissance canons demanded a tripod and long time working on composition, moving lens and film plane and checking the result on the ground glass. When the hand held photography and its instantaneity became and irresistible appeal to the turmoiled XX century, we learnt reading images where orthogonality of things was almost concealed by new camera view points.



More than a century passed and there are still large format cameras in production. There are even new brands being launched. You can find an interesting (hilarious in some points) discussion in a forum where large format photographers are talking about a new brand called Chamonix from China!   Chamonix is coming!. The camera itself you find on sale in Ebay. One can still find large format B&W film, for instance at:   Fotoimpex  . If you Gogle brands like Efke, Foma, Rollei, Forte, you will find sources of film for large format. Development of negative and print you can do it from raw chemicals. There is extensive information on the web. A good one is:   Umblinking Eye; . I am saying that just to point that it is still a living thing.



To finish, I would like to show the first pictures I took with this camera and lens. On the left is my son Andre, with his bass. In the middle my wife reading newspaper in a Sunday morning, as she always does. The third one is Chico Parodi and his mother and I am very glad that I could make this photo.