Image Survey Examples and Suggestions for Submitting
Philipps or Wurlitzer Pianella/PianOrchestra
and Paganini Music Rolls

(Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

This is a scan of an early Wurlitzer "The PianOrchestra" music roll label, with the tunes hand typed in purple ink. The label was pasted onto the leader of a red paper Philipps music roll cut in Germany. Although the ink is faded the tunes can still be deciphered. Scanning is ideal for capturing music roll labels, but when photographing this kind of label with a cell or smart-phone it is important to hold the camera a bit off center to reduce flash glare, so as to not render the faded text unreadable.

(Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of an early Philipps music roll leader with a beautifully handwritten tune list. Although in this instance the rolled-up leader is easy to read, many rolls have more tunes, and so it is generally better to lay the leader out flat to photograph it, while holding the camera a little off center to reduce glare from the camera flash.

(Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of an early Philipps music roll with a Wurlitzer "The PianOrchestra" label pasted on it. Instead of the usual hand type list of tunes in this instance a printed tune list is pasted onto the PianOrchestra label. While this label is readable with a little extra effort it would have been much better to have laid it out flat, with the camera held slightly off center to reduce glare from the camera flash.

(Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of an early loose PianOrchestra music roll label that is faded and badly tattered. Even in such poor condition most of the tune information is readable with some extra effort, and what is missing can often be guessed and/or recovered by comparing what is readable to other tunes already listed in the Rollography. In this instance any missing information was recovered, except for the roll number, and the roll listed in the Rollography as a Style 17 music roll with an unknown number. Here, as when photographing any other label, holding the camera slightly off center will help reduce glare from the camera flash.

(Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of a Wurlitzer Style 17 PianOrchestra music roll label for music roll #530. The lighting in this instance is evenly disbursed, and so the entire label is easily readable. However, if the the top or bottom of the label is shaded it can be very difficult to read. So it is recommended that the roll leader be laid out flat when photographing it, and to hold the camera slightly off center to reduce glare from the camera flash.

Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of a Wurlitzer Style 17 PianOrchestra music roll label for roll #561. The is a good example of poor lighting that makes reading the last tunes on the label exceptionally difficult, if not impossible. Such lighting issues are easily eliminated by simply laying the music roll leader out flat, and then holding the camera slightly off center so as to reduce the chance of glare from the camera flash.

Photograph courtesy of Michael Lund)

Raw iPhone image of the box label for a Wurlitzer Style 17 PianOrchestra music roll. Notice that the photograph was taken with the box slightly turned to prevent glare from the camera flash. This makes it easy to read the entire label, with any parallax distortion of no consequence.