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Thread: Old Laser on a Magazine Cover

  1. #1
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    Default Old Laser on a Magazine Cover

    Between the Hughes press release in July 1960 (announcing the first laser) and the fall of '62 (when the CW visible beam He-Ne became available commercially), lasers were in the lab and nursed by physicists. Pictures from that period of lasers are hard to find, but here's a really good one. It shows Robert J. Collins of Bell Labs with a ruby laser on the cover of Radio-Electronics of May, 1961. The article by him and D. F. Nelson is a short one titled "The Optical Maser - Communications at 450,000,000 Mc!", and includes a sketch of the innards of the ruby laser head.

    One of the pioneers of laser light projections is Lloyd G. Cross, who built the first commercial laser light show projector called the "Sonovision Audio-Display Unit". He previously founded the first company started specifically to make pulsed lasers, Trion Instruments, in 1961 (though Raytheon sold the first laser commercially in March of that year). Lloyd started Trion with Don Gillespie (later of Eldon), after the two heard a talk about the ruby laser given in Ann Arbor by Robert Collins. This picture of him is from right at that time. A real nugget for the collection!

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    Here's the post I made a while ago about Sonovision. The link to the listing is dead, so here's the ad from a 1969 Billboard.

    http://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/...ght=sonovision

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    Last edited by Eidetic; 09-20-2014 at 14:30.

  2. #2
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    Amazing find! Now if you could come across an original Sonovision - that would be like the holy grail of lasershow projectors! Lloyd Cross also founded a school of holography in San Fransisco in the early '70's and started the Multiplex Corporation to make white light cylindrical holograms using a technique and machine (made out of particle board and innertubes!) he invented. I met Lloyd around 1974 and I still have a multiplex hologram made by him called "The Kiss" where a woman appears to wink and blow a kiss as you walk around it. People called them holograms but technically they were holographic stereograms. I am going to will it to you for your collection which is shaping up to be world class! I would love to see a website displaying all your stuff. Keep up the good work!
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    Last edited by Photonbeam; 09-20-2014 at 15:18.

  3. #3
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    It's really appropriate for the laser to be on the cover of THIS magazine, as Maiman originally called his device an "atomic radio light". The first paragraph of the article explains how despite some calling it a laser, "the tendency to simply say 'optical maser' is growing".

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by Photonbeam View Post
    Amazing find! Now if you could come across an original Sonovision - that would be like the holy grail of lasershow projectors! Lloyd Cross also founded a school of holography in San Fransisco in the early '70's and started the Multiplex Corporation to make white light cylindrical holograms using a technique and machine (made out of particle board and innertubes!) he invented. I met Lloyd around 1974 and I still have a multiplex hologram made by him called "The Kiss" where a woman appears to wink and blow a kiss as you walk around it. People called them holograms but technically they were holographic stereograms. I am going to will it to you for your collection which is shaping up to be world class! I would love to see a website displaying all your stuff. Keep up the good work!
    Click image for larger version. 

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    The hologram you showed in the pics in this post were of "Kiss 2", made in 1975. It's about the most famous hologram image. Lloyd made an earlier version in 1973 called "The Kiss", also showing Pam Brazier but this time with a hat. I just received one from Lon Moore (first student at the School of Holography in San Francisco and there when it was made), shown here. If you have one of *this* image Steve, you have a super holo-nugget!

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    I can't resist including this one, despite the terrible picture of it that doesn't show the batter's head (his head's not lit well in the hologram). It's called "Baseball Players" from the Multiplex Company around 1974, featuring Selwyn Lissack as the batter and Lloyd Cross as the catcher. This one also came recently from Lon, who decided to clean his closet.

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    And finally, what has to be one of the last integral holograms made by Multiplex in 1979 is this one of the USS Enterprise from "Star Trek, The Motion Picture". I was told that it was commissioned for use as decoration at a studio party for the opening of the movie.

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    Outstanding collection! Yes, mine is a "Kiss II" from '74. One of my favorites was "Pam and Helen". These must be extremely rare. A Google search turns up a few references but amazingly, not a single image.

  7. #7
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    "Pam & Helen" was the first hologram image I ever saw, and it launched my career in '79. I got a 360 degree copy with display a few years ago from Larry Goldberg, former head of Holex (a big seller of holograms in the '70s). Also have a 120 degree piece.

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    Here's "Celeste with Banana", also called "Banana Lady", from 1974.

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    And finally, "Garden of Eden" c1975 (also featuring Celeste).

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    Last edited by Eidetic; 04-26-2015 at 08:11.

  8. #8
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    Oh yes! Fantastic!

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    lol i never thought i would see "laserporn" but i guess this is a first
    sadly i only have one hologram to my name, i will try to get a pick of it later but it's of a pcb board i am guessing is from a hard drive, i believe it was from 1991 and made on a film that used to be made by Polaroid,
    Remember Remember The 8th of November, When No One Stood, but Kneel, In Surrender
    In a popular government when the laws have ceased to be executed, as this can come only from the corruption of the republic, the state is already lost. Montesquieu

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    I think Chris (Lazerjock) has a hologram that reveals a woman taking her robe off, but as it rotates, you can't see any of the naughty bits because her back is to you when the robe falls. And of course, by the time it rotates back around she has pulled the robe back up...

    Adam

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