Now is the WINTU of our discontent - anyone used one?

[david werbeloff]

Hi All,

Has anyone used a WINTU with any success? It sounds like a great idea on paper...

Best,
David

 

[Mr_Flibble]

Can't say I have. I have seen them around at shows, but never saw one used . Except in a photo taken with a one on the camera, where you can see the photographer in the reflection of a window.

ah, here it is: http://www.shorpy.com/node/2607?size=_original

 

[Erik van Straten]

There is a famous picture from the early thirties by Henri Cartier-Bresson of a man with a bowl-hat sitting in a side-walk café in Paris. In the reflection of the window HCB is visible and he is using a WINTU-like device.

I have one, but it is damn hard to use.

Erik.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Dear David,

Yeah. On a IIIa. More trouble than it was worth, in my book. Sold it decades ago. But try to get a copy of Mon Parishch by Ilya Ehreburg, IZOGIZ, Moscow 1933, reissued (with English translation, as My Paris) by Edition 7L, Paris, 2005: all shot with the non-rangefinder version. Both RF and non-RF models were made: I think WINTU/WINTU CHROM was the rf version.

Cheers,

R.

 

[sevo]

. But try to get a copy of Mon Parishch by Ilya Ehreburg, IZOGIZ, Moscow 1933, reissued (with English translation, as My Paris) by Edition 7L, Paris, 2005: all shot with the non-rangefinder version.

WTF did he use it for? At that point in time a Leica must have been so uncommon a sight that nobody knew how and which way it was supposed to be pointed, so it can't have been any use in terms of stealth...

Was sideways focusing more like the focus knob on the strut-type press cameras of the day, or was it faster transport, or merely for left eyed shooting?

 

[Roger Hicks]

WTF did he use it for? At that point in time a Leica must have been so uncommon a sight that nobody knew how and which way it was supposed to be pointed, so it can't have been any use in terms of stealth...

Was sideways focusing more like the focus knob on the strut-type press cameras of the day, or was it faster transport, or merely for left eyed shooting?

You may be right, but Ilya didn't think so. Nor do I, actually. With a Leica at your eye, you're looking straight at someone. With a WINTU, you're facing at right angles.

Focusing was identical with any other Leica, but seen though a prism in the case of RF cameras (not like Ilya's), so I'm not sure what the question is there.

Cheers,

R.

 

[archive59]

Most of the screw mount Robots have what is in effect a WINTU built in and much seemed to be made of the 'stealth' capabilities of this in the advertising literature of the time. In my experience not easy to use and you can't help but feel vaguely ludicrous doing so. The photographer as surrealist performance art maybe.

 

[SteveM(PA)]

Helen Levitt took many of her photos with the wintu

 

[SteveM_NJ]

Just goes to show that "we'll try anything for a photograph". (tricky devil).

 

[Roger Hicks]

Most of the screw mount Robots have what is in effect a WINTU built in and much seemed to be made of the 'stealth' capabilities of this in the advertising literature of the time. In my experience not easy to use and you can't help but feel vaguely ludicrous doing so. The photographer as surrealist performance art maybe.

I'd forgotten that but of course you're right: a switchable finder, straight through or right angle. Perhaps it was one of those many things that 'focus groups' said they wanted, but nobody really cared for. Much like most political policies really.

Is it most? I thought it was dropped early on. But it's entirely possible that I am misremembering.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Paul T.]

Good title, but as you're in Boston maybe "WIntu in America?" would have been even better?

 

[Ljós]

First, love the title of the thread! 🙂

Then: reminds me of Helen Levitt who used the AUFSU for a similar purpose. If I am not mistaken the AUFSU gives you a TLR-like effect.

Greetings, Ljós

 

[sevo]

(dupe deleted)

 

[sevo]

Is it most? I thought it was dropped early on.

It was carried on at least until the Star (from 1952 on) - but the Vollautomat Star II of 1958 did not have it any more. Star publicity emphasized its use as waist-level/low-level finder. The stealth finder fad seems to have already have ended before or with the war - and I still find it strange that it existed back then, at a point in time when there was a crazy diversity in camera types and finder mechanisms, and when a angled finder could hardly hope to be any more stealthy than the waist level finders of then current SLRs or the (also angled) brilliant finders common on folders.

 

[archive59]

I'd forgotten that but of course you're right: a switchable finder, straight through or right angle. Perhaps it was one of those many things that 'focus groups' said they wanted, but nobody really cared for. Much like most political policies really.

Is it most? I thought it was dropped early on. But it's entirely possible that I am misremembering.

Cheers,

R.

What I meant to say was most of the Robot II form factor cameras had a WINTU-like finder. That is the II, IIa and Star. The exception being the Junior, a cheaper version of the Star that did away with the right angle finder and film rewind handle. Some of the wartime Luftwaffen Eigentum cameras also had the right angle finder omitted.
I find it interesting that as the Robot camera started to gain popularity for espionage use it lost the facility you would have thought made it well suited for the purpose. But then again a camera hidden in a bag is probably more discreet than one stuck on the end of your nose pointing sideways.

 

[david werbeloff]

Hello, and thanks to all of you who contributed to this thread.
Thank you Roger for your heads-up on Moi Parisch; I shall try to track this book down.

It is curious that the WINTU was an accessory available very early on in the Leica's history. It's a fairly complex device with prisms etc. (hard and expensive to manufacture?) and has no purpose other than to facilitate the taking of photographs of people without their knowledge. This makes me think that there must have been a demand for such a device early on. Ilya Ehrenburg's work bears testimony to this.

While we're on the subject of candid photography: Have any of you come across "A Vanished World" by Roman Vishniak. This is an extraordinary photographic document of the Jewish communities of Eastern Europe before the Holocaust. The format of the photographs makes me think that a medium format camera was used, but given the shyness and avoidance of "graven images" on the part of his subjects, I cannot imagine how Vishniak captured these images in less than a covert manner.

Best wishes,
David

 

[L David Tomei]

Got one along with other extras that arrived with a IIIa a couple years ago. Out of curiosity I used it but not only found it awkward, but I looked like a damn fool.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Thank you Roger for your heads-up on Moi Parisch; I shall try to track this book down.

Dear David,

The reprint (with translation) is probably still available from Ludilivre/Desachy in France (Google them). That's where I bought mine, at Arles 2011.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Erik van Straten]

It is curious that the WINTU has no purpose other than to facilitate the taking of photographs of people without their knowledge.

This is a mistake. It was used mostly as a device to facilitate reproduction photography. Leitz offered a lens cap with an accessory-shoe on it. The camera was mounted on the reproduction stand with the special lens cap on the lens on wich the WINTU was mounted. When looking through the WINTU one could position the object to be reproduced exactly. Of course, when taking the actual photograph the lenscap and the WINTU had to be removed.

Erik.

 

[david werbeloff]

Hello, Eric,

Mea culpa; I stand corrected! The process you describe sounds tedious but it offers a more logical explanation for the development of this device. Thank you for sharing.

Best,
David