  The Horizon is a Russian camera that can still be bought new. It is a swing-lens 35mm panoramic camera that takes pictures the equivalent size of a little over one and half 35mm frames side by side to make a 24 x 58mm image. In a swing lens camera, the lens is situated at the end of a short tube, at the other end of which is a slit. The film is loaded around a curved film plane and then, as the exposure is made, the lens swings through an arc, progressively building up the image on the film as it goes. The faster the lens swings, the faster the effective shutter speed. In this respect it is similar to the Horizont and FT-2 which were also made in Russia in the 1950s. The camera is shown above, with one of its images, taken at the Palace of Versailles in France. Return to home page |