During a recent conversation with Garry Alexander about the Electropan Panoramic camera, he recommended an extraordinary book on panoramic cameras. Intrigued, I immediately ordered it from a UK-based vendor. I’m delighted to report that it’s a truly remarkable resource—easily the best, most comprehensive book on this subject that I’ve encountered so far.
At around 550 pages, this hefty volume delves deep into the history and technology of panoramic cameras, from photography’s earliest days to the present. It’s packed with photographs, cutaway diagrams, and an impressive wealth of well-researched details on countless panoramic camera models. For anyone who’s serious about panoramic photography, this book by Brian Polden is absolutely essential. We owe him our thanks for creating such a valuable contribution to the community.
Because the book is quite extensive, I anticipate needing at least a month to go through it thoroughly. Once I’ve done so, I’ll be writing a comprehensive review on it.
Meanwhile, I want to acknowledge Garry Alexander for alerting me to this gem. Garry maintains an excellent website dedicated to panoramic cameras (among other interesting cameras), and he’s also deeply involved in mechanical automata, another topic that fascinates me. If you share a love for mechanical marvels like I do, I highly recommend visiting Cabaret Mechanical Theatre to explore more of Garry’s interests.
The book was published in 2019 and there are only a few resources discussing it. You can have look at the table of contents from the Publisher's site.
A glimpse on Seitz's Roundshot series of pano cameras as mentioned in this book can be found from Seitz's web page
I purchased my copy from PostScript in the UK, and their service was commendably quick, delivering the book across the Atlantic. I’m very pleased with their professionalism and would highly recommend them.
