An apparatus for dental and facial imaging including a rotatable gantry having an axis of rotation generally in the direction of local gravitational vertical; a source of penetrating radiation mounted on the gantry; an elongated detector for detecting radiation and producing image data, the detector mounted opposite the source on the gantry, and having a length, a long axis, and a short axis The gantry, source, and detector configured to receive the head of a patient between the source and the detector, with the axis of rotation of the gantry passing through the patient's head. The detector is mounted rotatably to the gantry and movable between a first position where the long axis of the detector is generally perpendicular to the axis of rotation of the gantry and a second position where the long axis of the detector is generally parallel to the axis of rotation of the gantry.