Bassingbourn from a window, 1944

There were two distinct groups of shots the photographer made from the windows of his room at the barracks. Some of these are back up shots made at the same time with different camera settings. The following are groupings to show the two sessions and their back up shots. These are from two continuous uncut strips.

It was a dark, cloudy day and clearly he was asking the maximum from the film that was available to him.

This strip of negatives is labeled:

Views of field from room windows in men's #1 f3.5 - 200, 35mm w/angle Red Filter sun obscured

Note that he says "WINDOWS"

These negatives are from Bassingbourn, AAF base in England about 1944. The collection is full of aircraft and equipment and structures and this page, the photographer. If you have come late to this examination of 327 negatives found in a flea market,
HERE is where it starts.

The other session was probably the same day but it is unclear. The clouds are not the same so some time had passed between sessions.

There was no shot at all for the far left panel, but he took three shots at the Quonset hut area.
The photographer's notations for this group are:
Window views as above f3.5/200 35mm w/angle, red filter, brite

Below is a stitching of six of the eleven photographs to provide a panorama view of Bassingbourn AAF base. There is some fish-eye distortion and "tunneling" caused by the photographer's wide angle lens.

Using a Google satellite view several key points were established and by means of triangulation, the point at which the eleven photographs were taken is established.

It must have been a corner room considering the spread of the shots. That also accounts for some of the differences in the angle of the shots.

How this was done: From the left, see the second and third red dots. One is on the corner of the tall structure and the other just below it on the corner of the seven-windowed, two story building. These two points were located in the satellite shot and a line drawn through them. The rest of the lines were done using the same method.

Seeing the changes in the photographer's viewpoint.

Number One is from the first set.
Nunbers Two and Three are from the second set.

Note that ONE and THREE are almost identical but TWO was shot from a point several feet to the left, probably from another window in the room.

The last frame on the second strip of 35mm negatives is this self portrait. The window in the frame is probably one of the windows for the panorama shots.

He apparently opened a closet door where a mirror was mounted, then standing at the corner of his army cot, he took his own picture.

The notation for the negative in the file:
Self mirror portrait El. 3.5/40.

From another place in the negative file is this portrait on another day, another room. Note that this room seems to be on the ground floor. The room that originated the panorama negatives was at least on the second floor perhaps the third.

I make it a Leica 3B. What do you think?

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Other war related BACK PAGES include:
BACK PAGE - C'est la Guerre - Page One
BACK PAGE - C'est la Guerre - Page Two
Bassingbourn from a Window, 1944 (This one.)
Album Page - From one abandoned album
Album Page - Five Lost Photographs

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THE KIDS
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