Camera Obscura Research Paper

Words: 1175
Pages: 5

Camera obscura is the earliest form of photography. It consists of a dark box or room with a small opening or aperture on one side this opening allows light to enter the box striking the wall on the other side. When the light strikes the wall it reproduces the scene on the outside. However, the image if not modified by lens or a mirror will be flipped 180 degrees and appear upside down. The smaller the opening the sharper the image gets however having a smaller opening also dims the image.
Camera obscura back when it was first being used had a major setback it was impossible to capture the image projected onto the back wall because the technology had not been invented yet. Early artists would then take the image projected and copy or trace it as a way to preserve the image as shown below. This type of image capturing is also more commonly known as a pinhole camera.
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He used the process of Heliography this process has a naturally occurring asphalt like substance called Bitumen coating a metal or glass plate. This plate is then exposed to light through a pinhole camera and the Bitumen then hardened according to how much light the individual areas were exposed to. After the exposure process (which usually took around 8 hours!) the metal plate would then be washed with a dissolving material. The dissolvent would create light and dark spots based on how hard the Bitumen became. Once this process is complete you know have a negative sheet with which you can create