This Camera Was Used for Aerial Photos During WWII
The Fairchild K-17 aerial camera, used by both the British Royal Air Force and the United States Air Force during WW2, had a 24" lens and weighed a ridiculous 75 pounds (34kg)! One of the later models of this camera, the Fairchild K-20, was famously used to photograph the nuclear mushroom cloud over Hiroshima. This Camera Was Used for Aerial Photos During WWII Check out this absolute unit of a camera that was used to do aerial photography during World War II. Mounted on the front of the camera is a massive 2-foot long 610mm f/6 lens. This viral photo has made the rounds on the Web in recent years, and the camera has widely been misidentified as a Kodak K-24. It’s actually a Fairchild K-17, which was designed by Fairchild Camera and Instrument and manufactured under license for the US Air Force by Folmer Graflex in Rochester, New York (Kodak’s hometown), in the early 1940s. The Fairchild K-17 shot 9×9-inch (22.86×22.86cm) photos on 9 1/2-inch wide roll film. 6-inch, 12-inch...