Sale 2561 | Lot 396
396 •(ATOMIC BOMB--MANHATTAN PROJECT)
A series of 19 photographs by Berlyn Brixner depicting The Trinity Test, the first detonation of a nuclear device, as developed by the Los Alamos Laboratory.
These time-lapse photographs of The Trinity Project depict the period from 0.10 milliseconds to 60 seconds after the detonation, the first milliseconds after detonation in a series of two sheets, and a sheet with a sequence of four images taken with an aerial camera 18 miles away. Silver prints, 17 measuring approximately 6½x9 inches (16.5x22.9 cm.), and two sheets with a series of images, each sheet 8x10 inches (20.3x25.4 cm.), each with technical information in the negative, the sequential number in pencil, on recto, and the Official Los Alamos Project hand stamp, on verso; approximately 1/3 of the prints with notations or captions, in pencil, on recto or verso. 1945
[4,000/6,000]
Berlyn Brixner was the head photographer for the Manhattan Project's Trinity test. He was stationed at a distance of 10,000 yards from the blast. Using fifty 16mm high-speed cameras, with various combinations of film speed, he made over 100,000 photographs of Trinity, capturing, in immense detail, the raw nuclear power of the first Atomic detonation.
