In article <4rsm9n$avl@cello.hpl.hp.com>, jacobson@cello.hpl.hp.com says...
>In article <4rs6n6$j32@sjx-ixn6.ix.netcom.com>,
>Michael Shavel wrote:
>>I am in the market for a good 35mm panoramic camera -- by good I mean
>>$1000 price tag and up. I was wondering if anyone out there has a unit
>>they are happy with or know of some good units worth checking out. [..]

>There are two kinds of panoramic camera.

Well, actually, three, if one does not limit oneself to 35mm......

>There is really fancy kind that shoot a large picture by moving the
>lens (Widelux) or or lens and film (Circut (sp?)). I'm no expert, but
>I haven't heard of one of these sorts of things for 35mm. (Someone
>please correct me if I'm wrong.)

Uh, OK ;-): at least Widelux, Horizon, and Globuscope.......

>Then there are the consumer panoramic cameras. These are, IMO, a
>sham. All they do is mask the top and bottom of an ordinay 35mm frame
>so the height is somewhere around 10 or 12 mm (?) rather than 24mm.
>If this is what you are thinking of, just use an ordinary 35mm camera
>and ask the photofinisher to print panoramic format prints for you.
>Some might refuse if it wasn't shot with the mask. If so, just go
>elsewhere.

And then there are the large-format types that use long, skinny sheets
of film or 120 roll film to make a wide aspect-ratio image (similar to
the masked-35mm type, but no film area is disgarded, and the angle-of-view
is generally much greater). IM(NS)HO, these share, also, the negative
aspect of 35mm cropped-panorama cameras: they often look like a cropped
part of a larger, more normally proportioned image (though, given the
coverage of some, the "uncropped" image would have been badly
vignetted if it were all there.....).

>There are lots of excellent 35mm cameras in the $1000 range. A few
>may have a mask you can move into place for panoramic prints. But I
>wouldn't limit myself to these. Better cameras have interchangable
>focusing screens. If you try you may be able to find a focusing screen
>with lines that show the limits of a panoramic print. Or you might
>try your luck and mark such lines on a screen.

Or build your own whiz-bang rotating-lens camera, using a fisheye
lens for REAL wide-angle coverage (180 degrees vertical, 360 degrees
horizontal is possible.........). BTW, I used to build curved-"film"
pinhole cameras in which I shot paper - the curve around the pinhole
provides far more even illumination than a super-wide flat-"film"
pinhole camera can.
Hope This Helps