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Leitz Stereoly attachment for Leica cameras.
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The CLT server will soon cease to exist, and these pages will disappear.
Please bookmark my new website: www.evanlindquist.com
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Evan Lindquist
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Emeritus Professor of Art
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On the next pages...
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- General information about Stereoly
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The original Leica Stereoly instruction manual, 1934
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How to clean and adjust a Stereoly
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How to view traditional 3-D photos
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How to attach a Stereoly to a modern digital camera
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Six galleries of photographs made with Stereoly (about 60 original 3-D views)
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Links to Stereoly information and Random Notes on Stereoly
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3-D movie of Dolly/Dali made with Stereoly in QuickTime |
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What is a Leica Stereoly?
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The Leitz instruction manual (1934) described the Stereoly as |
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"... a simple accessory which is easy to manipulate and permits stereo snapshots to be made with the Leica camera. ... In many cases a picture representing objects in solid relief differs so entirely from the flat picture in the impressions which it produces as to open up a wholly new range of interests."
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- Ernst Leitz in Wetzlar, Germany made a stereo lens attachment to fit Leica 35mm cameras from about 1931 to 1940. The attachment was a beam splitter which placed two images on one frame of 35mm film (24 x 36mm). Each image filled half of a full frame, and the resulting photograph could be printed on paper for viewing through a stereoscope, or it could be viewed as a slide or transparency through a special binocular viewer also made by Leitz. The Leitz code name for the stereo attachment was "STEREOLY", and the name for the viewer was "VOTRA". It appears that relatively few Stereoly and Votra units were made. Like all Leitz products, they were well made and most are probably still usable more than 60 years later.
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At left is a Stereoly attached by its "supporting arm" to a Leica IIIc camera. Also shown is the earlier style of supporting arm designed to attach the Stereoly to Leica camera models "A" and "C". |
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If you've uncovered an abandoned Stereoly in a forgotten drawer or box, you have to rescue it! It is a treasure that was designed to be used, and its amazing ability to capture 3-dimensional views will encourage you to look at your world in a new, more exciting way. |
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Cleaning and adjusting a Stereoly
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Your Stereoly is very old and probably has never been cleaned or adjusted. This maintenance is not complicated, and most camera repair people should be able to do it for you. Below, near the middle part of this page, I've placed a description with photos showing how I cleaned and adjusted a Stereoly that was nonfunctional. Its images were very dark, because the prisms were coated with brown nicotine stains. To make matters worse, a screw had worked loose, and one prism had slipped out of line. After being serviced, the Stereoly works perfectly.
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I use a Stereoly attached to a digital camera
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I've adapted a Stereoly to fit a modern digital camera. I use Adobe PhotoShop to convert the images to CMYK and save them either as PhotoShop documents or TIFF files. After cropping the image to remove the excess edges, I print with an inkjet printer, either on plain paper or on quality photo paper. The image size to print it depends on how it will be viewed. |
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I like to view stereo photographs with an antique "Holmes" stereoscope (designed by Oliver Wendel Holmes) which takes a 7 X 3.5-inch card.
The size of the image area for this type of stereocard is 6 inches X 3.5 inches. The dividing line between the two halves must be placed in the center of the full frame.
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At left are two Stereoly units (serial numbers 1009 and 1384). The latter is shown here in a wooden adapter that attaches it to a modern small digital camera (an Olympus C60 with a zoom lens). (More photos of the camera/Stereoly are below.) |
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- HOW TO CLEAN A LEITZ STEREOLY:
- or How I cleaned my Stereoly
| The Leitz Stereoly is a valuable piece of equipment. Improper handling can damage it. If you have no experience in repairing precision technical instruments, you should think twice before attempting this repair. Any damage that results to your Stereoly will be your own responsibility, not mine.
The photos below show the steps I took to disassemble, clean, and reassemble a Stereoly. I have not been trained to make these repairs, and I offer the information below merely to document what I have done. So take a look at the photos if you're curious about what kind of optics are inside this marvelous little attachment.
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(1) I began by setting up some containers to hold the screws that would be removed from #1384. First item removed was the name plate. The screws are very delicate and short, and I used a small screwdriver made especially for precision equipment. I know better than to booger up the screws with a crummy screwdriver! In this photograph, the name plate has been removed, revealing a spring clamp anchoring two lens prisms in position. The spring clamp has two metal springs -- don't know what the Leitz folks called them, but I'll call them "tangs". Each tang fits into a slot in the prism to hold it in place. One of the prisms inside #1384 had popped away from its tang, throwing one image out of alignment and destroying any chance of producing a 3-dimensional effect.
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(2) Two screws on the top side of the frame and two screws on the bottom side hold the spring clamp in place. After removing those four screws, the clamp was ready to lift up from the prisms. I expected it to release and slide upward on its own, but it didn't.
Then I noticed four other screws, two on top and two on bottom. They were set screws, apparently to keep the prisms from shifting. They didn't actually touch the prisms. I loosened them slightly without removing them from the threaded holes.
Still, I needed to apply a little bit of upward pressure to wiggle the prisms out.
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(3) I inserted the point of the screwdriver alternately under each of the two tangs and lifted gently upward, careful not to touch the glass directly below the tangs. A little lifting on each side brought the clamp up evenly. I was careful not to force it into a bind. As a reminder, and to make sure that the spring clamp and tangs would be reassembled in their original positions, I used a pencil to mark them.
(Note: I discovered later that left and right sides are interchangeable.) |
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(4) Because oil from fingertips can be hard to remove from glass, I protected the prisms by wearing white cotton gloves. The left prism is shown after being removed from the housing. Note the brown stain on the glass prism, apparently nicotine deposits from a heavy-smoking photographer. Both prisms were removed, and I could see that one was marked "-4" and the other was "+4". Both markings had been done with a graphite pencil. I made a note of their original positions to make certain that they would be replaced in the same order. I cleaned both prisms with Lens Cleaning Fluid and lens tissue (using very light pressure). Lenses are made with soft glass, easily picking up scratches which can degrade image quality.
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(5) The prism on the left has been cleaned. The one on the right still shows nicotine stains.
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(6) After cleaning both prisms, I lined them up in correct position before reassembling. The wide slots of the glass should be on the bottom. They fit over the two "slats" embossed on the bottom plate in the housing. The narrow slots on top of the glass will receive the tangs of the spring clamp.
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(7) To replace the spring clamp assembly to its original position, I set up a small C-clamp with two strips of wood and forced the spring clamp gently into position. When the four screw holes lined up perfectly I replaced the retaining screws. I had double-checked to make certain that all four slots on the glass prisms were accurately located. I did not apply any pressure until both prisms were properly seated -- they appear to be fragile, and I didn't want to take a chance on breaking them.
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(8) I tightened the four set screws, replaced the name plate, and tightened some other screws that appeared to be loose.
Finally, I did a few test shots which showed that this old Stereoly is once again ready to perform its amazing 3-dimensional magic.
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How I attached my old Leica Stereoly to a new digital camera
| Two Stereolys attached to cameras -- The Old and the New:
Leitz designed the Stereoly in 1931 to be anchored by a supporting arm with a "dovetail fitting" in front of the Leica camera. It functions as an auxiliary lens with 50mm Elmar and later lenses. Two Stereolys are shown in this photo. One is mounted on a Leica IIIc (1946) and the other is attached to the small Olympus C-60 with zoom lens (2004).
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| Stereoly attached to the digital camera:
My adaptor consists of two thin pieces of wood (I used walnut). One piece is a platform that holds the camera. The other is a lens board that holds the Stereoly. The camera platform slides into two slots in the lens board, and it is adjustable to allow extra space for a filter or for a different camera with a longer lens extension. The lens board and camera platform are locked together with a set-screw underneath.
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| Rear view of the camera and Stereoly:
The lens board is 18 mm thick. To make it, two thin pieces of walnut wood (9 mm thick) were glued up with grain running at 90-degree angles to each other for strength and stability. Otherwise, the wood could be expected to split along the grain. After the glue had cured overnight, the lens board was cut to shape with a scroll saw. Four small pieces of wood were glued to the back of the lens board to act as a retainer for the Stereoly.
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| Side view of the camera and Stereoly attachment:
I glued a foot onto the camera platform to make the unit level when it's placed on a table.
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| Front view of the Stereoly and Olympus C60 camera:
The camera attaches to the platform with a tripod screw. To remove the Stereoly from the lens board, the single screw (visible here) holding the retainer in front may be removed, and the Stereoly will slide out from the lens board.
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| Stereoly mounted upside-down in the adapter:
In this photo, the Stereoly is inserted upside-down into the lensboard. With the dovetail fitting turned underneath and out of the way, light from the flash spreads more evenly. I cut a notch in the lensboard (hidden behind the front retainer) to provide clearance space for the Stereoly's dovetail fitting.
The rubber pad cushions the camera.
A lens shade helps reduce light flare. It's not shown in this photo, but I made a very effective shade from a rectangle of black paper which fits over the top and around the sides.
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This combination of old Leica traditions and new digital concepts of photography is a lot of fun. The stereo photos are amazing with their stunning 3-D qualities. They may either be printed on an inkjet printer or be "free viewed" on the screen.
Using this equipment is a fantastic experience. A few years ago, I would not have believed it to be possible, but now, through the virtues of combining something old with something new, I'm making "instant" stereo photographs of things that I would have overlooked before.
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 Go to Gallery 1, photos made with Stereoly |
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The original Leica Stereoly instruction manual, 1934 |
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Random Notes on Stereoly
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I tried unsuccessfully to locate replacement screws for a Stereoly. An oboe player who repairs oboes and other instruments had a die to make the screws, which are slotted oval head screws. The die was SAE 1-72, which was close enough to make suitable replacements. All the Stereolys I've seen appear to be the same, but I'm not certain that Leitz used the same screws for all of them. |
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I've seen a Stereoly that has a scratch near one edge of a prism. When used on a Leica with 35mm film, the scratch caused no flare and seemed benign. But when used with a digital camera, the scratch scattered light everywhere. It's amazing how a digital camera magnifies flares. Trying to stop the light from filling the image, I filled the scratch with black printer's ink. It stopped the light from bouncing around inside the prism, and the scratch now shows up as a small black mark on the edge, an area which is normally cropped from the digital image. |
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I've seen Stereoly units with two different outside dimensions. However, the stereo base was the same in all. |
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The Stereoly fits closely around the old Leitz 50mm lenses that were designed to be used with it. This automatically baffles any light that might otherwise have entered the prisms. But the diameter of my digital camera lens is much smaller than the old Leitz lenses, leaving space between the lens and the Stereoly's rear window. A digital camera that has a flash window positioned much higher than the lens is not apt to have light from its flash entering the rear window of the prisms. Whenever intruding light has been a problem, I've made light baffles from fuzzy adhesive black Velcro tape, that is, the "hook" part of the tape. By lining the inside of the rear window with it, the intruding light was eliminated. |
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Some of the early Stereoly units have set screws on top and bottom that were slotted without heads. This allowed the set screw to go deep into the threaded hole, thus gouging into the side of the prism. Later, perhaps during the second year of production, slotted oval head screws were being used as the set screws. My guess is that some prisms might have been cracked when headless set screws were tightened too much. I suggest using caution if you are working on an early Stereoly with headless set screws. |
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This page was created in October 2004
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