Camera obscura
From Encyclopædia
The
camera obscura ("dark chamber"), forerunner of the photographic
camera, was a darkened room with a single small opening.
light coming through the opening projected an inverted image of a brightly-lit exterior object onto the opposite wall. The same effect could be achieved with a lightproof box. The ancients used the
camera obscura to view
eclipses; later, it was useful to artists for tracing reflected images. By the 19th century, lenses and mirrors had been added to correct the inversion and to project the image onto paper where it could be easily traced. In 1826, J. N. NIEPCE used a
camera obscura to project an image onto
light-sensitive paper, creating in effect the first photographic
camera.
