| Description
| Gnome 756 projector, 1960s.
Nowadays, sharing your photos is as simple as plugging a USB stick into a flat screen TV or posting them on social media. Before these even existed, showing holiday snaps to the family or doing a presentation were a bit more of a challenge.
Electric slide projectors emerged in the early 20th century, around the same time as cinema technology first appeared. They operated by shining light through a glass slide, similar to the “magic lantern” that came before. Projectors typically have a lightbulb that provides the light source (and is usually fan cooled to prevent it burning out), a condensing lens to direct this light onto the slide, a slide holder, and a lens for bringing the image into focus. This then projects an image onto a blank wall or screen.
Initially projectors were too expensive for ordinary people to own, but by the 1960s they were widely available. People’s wages had increased and the manufacturing costs had gone down, meaning that they had mass appeal. The cost written on the box of this Gnome projector is £28.15.0, which in the 1960s was equivalent to nearly two weeks’ wages. Gnome Photographic Products were a Cardiff-based company. They gained popularity with their projectors and cameras in the 1950s and 60s, a time when people in Britain had more leisure time than before – and more money to enjoy it! |
