Self-portrait through a camera obscura
Serene Go
Award: Top 100
School: bergen county technical high school - teterboro
Teacher: mone't kendall-turner
Category: Contrived
Photo #21450
Self-portrait through a camera obscura
A camera obscura, meaning "dark chamber", requires a closed container that blocks all light, except through a tiny aperture. Inside a darkroom, a film paper is placed into the camera which is then closed. It is taken outside to be pointed at a subject (in this case, me!), and the aperture is uncovered.
In everyday life, the sun's light rays hit objects and bounce off in many different directions. The camera's aperture is small enough to only let in rays that travel straight from myself into the pinhole. Once the rays hit the paper, the carefully controlled exposure forms the image.
The image created is actually upside-down. This happens because rays emitted from the upper parts of myself pass through the aperture diagonally downwards, hitting the bottom of the film. Rays reflected from lower parts travel upwards through the aperture and hit the top of the film.
For my entire figure to be shown, it is important to consider size and positioning. Using optics and similar triangles, it is found that the ratio between the paper's height and distance from the aperture is equal to the ratio between object's height and its distance. Depending on the object's or the paper's distance, the rays land on the film farther or closer apart, changing the image's size.
After several minutes of standing perfectly still, the camera is taken back into the darkroom and the film is soaked in chemical baths to fully develop. The result is a self-portrait worthy enough to frame!
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