Light and Darkness

Light is one of the most mysterious things to exist. It behaves like waves and particles, is made out of tiny particles with zero mass, and makes up all of the colors we see. Light stimulates sight and makes things visible. Light travels in a straight path, but bends and turns when it passes through a transparent material, like glass. When this happens, the wavelength of the light changes, but not the frequency. Instead, the direction and speed will change and the light will refract (bend or change directions). Prisms and lenses are examples of transparent materials that refract light.

In this unit of LST, we focused on the L part of the name. Light is what helps us see everything around us. In fact, light was the main ingredient for our most recent project. For this Action Project, I made a pinhole camera, or “camera obscure.” A pinhole camera is a simple camera with a tiny aperture - an opening through which light travels. The simplest definition for a pinhole camera is a dark box with a small hole light travels through to form a picture. It has many interesting qualities. For instance, the infinite depth of field allows objects that are close or far away to be captured with equal sharpness. Since a pinhole camera has a wide angle, the rays of light cannot reach the edges as quickly as the center of the picture, so edges appear darker. A disadvantage of the pinhole camera is that it is difficult to capture moving objects. This is due to the very small amount of light allowed through the hole. Also, the exposure time is counted in minutes, instead of a quick second. These last two issues are what made my picture turn out the way it did.

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Photos: SN

This is my pinhole camera. In order to build it, I first needed cut a small opening in an empty box. In order to prevent the light from reflecting, I painted the inside of the box black. Things that are white reflect light, sending it away. Reflection is when light bounces off a reflective surface, like a mirror, and is sent to travel in another direction. Therefore, if the inside of the box was white, the light would bounce off the sides and ruin the image. In order to prevent light from bouncing and escaping the camera, the black paint absorbed it. You know how, in some instances, light acts like a particle rather than a wave? This is an example of one of those key features because anything black absorbs it. Light can also bend in some instances, but that is for another project because there is no need for light to bend to make this camera work. Next, to create the aperture, I cut off a piece of a soda can, sanded it flat, and poked a tiny pinhole. I placed it over the small opening I cut into the box and taped the aperture in place. Finally, I made a little hatch out of cardboard that connected to the box in order to cover the pinhole. This hatch prevented light from entering the camera before I was ready to “snap” my image.

Illustrated by SN

These are my calculations for determining what the distance between my pinhole camera and the object I was going to take a picture of should’ve been, finding the hypotenuse of the two similar triangles, determining the value of angle theta, and determining the vale of the final angle. I took the height the pinhole of my camera was from the ground, the width of my camera, and the height of the object I was going to take a picture of in inches. I put all of the elements in the formula in two fractions, cross multiplied them, and divided the one multiplied by X on both sides to solve for it. Then, I squared the PH and CW and added them together to get the hypotenuse of the first triangle and did the same for the other, but with the distance from the back of the camera to the object and the objects height. Next, I found the value for angle theta, by multiplying the opposite over adjacent by tan^-1. Finally, if found the value for the final angle by subtracting the value of angle theta by 90 degrees. I made a mistake in the diagram above and multiplied it instead.

Photo: SN

This is the picture I took with my pinhole camera after I set it up in a darkroom. The process for setting up the camera was much easier in the darkroom, than it was at the school. At the school, we had to open our cameras, put the special pieces of paper in them, and seal them back up in pitch black darkness. Even though I may not have done a perfect job, it was not the reason why my first piece of paper ended up with too much exposure to light. I forgot to cover the aperture in my pinhole camera before I was ready to take the ten minute picture. Even though my first one did not turn out well, I am happy with the one you see here. Along with getting a second chance at taking a good picture, I got to see equipment exclusively made for making these photos appear on the pieces of paper. This photo was made visible thanks to that equipment. I know it seems weird and blurry, but the imperfections make it interesting. The reason why it turned out so blurry is because I was taking a picture of myself and had to stand still for some time. I, obviously, did not do that and the hatch I used to block the pinhole started covering it again due to wind. It may not look like what it is supposed to be, but I am very happy with it.

A pinhole camera is one of the many experiments you can perform with light. The applications of light are limitless. Without sunlight, the world would be dead and dark. Sunlight helps us see, keeps the Earth warm, is a source of energy, and is a major component in photosynthesis, which is how most of the plant life on Earth grows. It is all the colors in the rainbow, the particles with 0 mass traveling in every direction at 300,000,000m/s, and the one thing that acts like both particles and waves. I live with light everyday and have never really thought of how powerful it is before taking this class. I feel like I have a much better understanding of how important and versatile light is. The next two topics I will be learning about this term are sound and time. Stay tuned!