278 



CYCLORAMA. 



CYCLORiHA. This word is derived from the 

 Greek words KVK\OS, a circle, and opap.a, a 

 scene ; its natural English meaning is a circu- 

 lar scene. It is of comparatively recent origin, 

 and is found only in the latest editions of dic- 

 tionaries, although the system of pictorial rep- 

 resentation to which it is now applied, includ- 

 ing the laws of cycloramic perspective, have 

 heen understood for two or three centuries. 

 It is only within a generation that cyclorumas 

 have heen painted and constructed with a sat- 

 isfactory degree of mechanical perfection, and 

 only about ten years since the aid of photog- 

 raphy and of greatly improved machinery and 

 accessories has produced the wonderfully real- 

 istic effects attained in the great paintings of 

 American battle-scenes recently exhibited in 

 the principal cities of the United States. In 

 preparing a painting of this character the or- 

 dinary rules of perspective are useless, save in 

 a fragmentary way. The observer, instead of 

 including the entire picture in the natural angle 

 of vision, is surrounded by the painted canvas 



SECTION OF A CYCLORAMA. 



just as he is surrounded by the landscape when 

 out-of doors. This necessitates different points 

 of sight, or vanishing-points as they are tech- 

 nically called. (See article on DRA.WING, in 

 Appletons' k ' American Cyclopaedia.") Strictly 

 speaking, these points are infinite in number in 

 a cyclorama, but practically they are reduced to 

 as small a number as is consistent with pictur- 

 esque representation. This is known as cy- 

 cloramic perspective. In the great historical 



was centered on the platform and arranged so 

 that it could sweep the entire horizon, and ten 

 pictures were taken, each including two of the 

 twenty-four range-stakes. In the finished pho- 

 tographs the stakes served to register the series, 

 and when attached in a continuous strip the 

 ten pictures, of course, gave a continuous pano- 

 rama of the field. Pasting together the ends of 

 this strip, the panorama became a cyclorama, 

 and afforded an accurate guide for enlargement 

 on the grand scale contemplated for the paint- 

 ing. Of course, each separate photograph had 

 its own system of linear perspective, and artis- 

 tic ingenuity had to reconcile the apparent dis- 

 tortions of the camera an ea?y task, since the 

 vanishing-point for any object could be ascer- 

 tained by projecting the radius of the great 

 circle to the general horizon-line, which is, of 

 course, common to the whole painting. 



A special building is required for such a 

 work as this. Those that have been built in 

 this country are mostly of corrugated iron, cir- 

 cular in general shape, and large enough to 

 leave space for passage behind the 

 canvas after it is in place. In the 

 center is a circular platform a lit- 

 tle lower than the horizon-line of 

 the painting. This is covered with 

 a canopy, cutting the line of vision 

 just below the top of the painting. 

 The light falls from above this 

 canopy through a sky -light by day, 

 and from a circle of electric lights 

 by night. From this platform the 

 progress of the painting is super- 

 intended. 



The canvas is fifty feet wide, 

 and when ready for hanging is 

 wound on a large roller arranged 

 so that it can revolve on a ver- 

 tical axis. A circular tram way is 

 laid on the floor of the building 

 close to the outer wall, and a frame 

 mounted on wheels runs on this, 

 carrying the canvas-roll. A wooden cornice- 

 frame runs around the entire building at the 

 eaves, and to it the upper edge of the canvas is 

 nailed. The frame is rolled along the circular 

 track as fast as necessary, delivering the canvas 

 as it moves. When the canvas is in position 

 and the ends sewed together, its lower edge is 

 attached to a huge ring made of gas- pipe, cor- 

 responding in size with the cornice-frame. The 

 ring and the twenty-five-pound weights hung 



painting of the battle of Gettysburg, the art- all round at three-foot intervals are sustained 

 ist, Paul Philippoteaux, who has also superin- by the canvas, which is thus strained heavily 

 tended the execution of most of the other great downward, and can yet expand or contrf 

 paintings of this class, personally inspected the without wrinkling. Instead, however, of forr 

 battle-field and selected the most available cen- ing a perfect cylinder in shape when placed ii 

 tral position from an artistic point of view. 

 Here he erected a scaffolding with a platform 

 at a suitable height, and drew a circle around 

 it about eighty feet in diamoter. At intervals 

 of about twenty-four feet stakes were driven 



in this circle dividing the whole circumference 

 into ten equal parts. A photographic camera 



position and weighted, the canvas bulges in- 

 ward a foot or more midway between the uj 

 per and lower edges, and the horizon-line, aj 

 parently the most distant part of the painting 

 is really.nearer to the observer than the 

 and the middle distance. 



After the painting is finished, and the m( 



