Camera Obscura

Before today I had used a pinhole camera a couple times, so I knew the image would be upside down and a negative projection. The first time we looked at the image, it was on a medium size piece of paper and the image appeared immediately. I could clearly see the upside down image of the courtyard projected onto the paper. When we took the medium paper away to see the image on the white wall, the image wasn't as clear. I could see where the sky should be on the bottom and the building above it, but it was a lot harder for my eyes to focus to see the actual image. I think if I saw, or at least knew, what was projected onto the wall before hand it would have been a little easier to focus.

This is a drawing of the image from the second camera. My drawing doesn't do much justice to the true image because the ball was a lot more 3-D.

Analysis

This image was taken at 11:10am when the clouds started to ease up. The space is framed by tall apartment complexes on all sides that do not let too much sun light into the street. Once your eye travels to the top of the buildings, the image seems to stop abruptly. This could be because there is little variation in the colors; everything seems washed out and gray. Cars line the right ride of the street and don't seem to reflect much of the sun. If you look at the picture from the bottom to the top, the image is weighed down by the color of the dark concrete and asphault. The clouds make the space look dark, cold, and somewhat smaller than it is in person.

This image was taken at 2:10pm. Just above the row of parked cars, you can see the reflections of windows from the building on the left. In the area of fire escape on the left there is patch where the sun is clearly hitting, also giving the series of windows on the upper level of the building straight ahead an orange glow. The people walking next to the building on the right give the viewer an idea at how large the buildings in the space are. One can assume the buildings are fairly large because the first row of windows allign with the heads of the two people. Unlike the first picture, looking from bottom to top, the space seems to slightly taper off. This could be because the sun allows a variation in the colors of the space. The space in this picture appears to be slightly bigger, and even warmer, compared to the first image.

This image was taken at 5:30pm just after the sun set. The space is mainly illuminated by the camera's flash, and the passing car's headlights. The headlights of the passing car are reflected on the tail lights of the parked cars, allowing the viewer to make a guess at the size of the space.


I'd describe the second picture, the most interesting time of day, to someone who was blind as the way a candle stick would feel right after the flame was blown out. Starting at the ground, the colors are cool shades of gray, even the brick is a cool shade of red. As you get closer to the top of the image, the sun shines on portions of the buildings, and the bricks are warm shades of red (especially in the building that is straight ahead). As a whole, the image tapers off at the top. A candle stick is cool, and somewhat wider at the bottom, and thinner and warmer towards the top where the flame once was. However, the flame would no longer be lit because the sun cannot be seen, and the temperature at this time of day was not particularly warm.

Research Questions

1. Who were they?
Ancient Egyptians

2. Why did they keep time?
Farmers kept time to figure the times best for cultivating and harvesting crops. Preists and astronomers of Ancient Egypt kept time to determine the exact time to perform daily rituals, and to hold major religious festivals.

3. Did their relationship to time relfect inherent beliefs?
Yes, the Ancient Egyptian's relationship to time did reflect inherent beliefs. The fact that preists and astronomers had a specific use for time keeping (to determine the time for daily rituals and important religious festivals) demonstrates the strong connection the Egyptians had to their religion.

4. What did they keep time with?
The Egptians first kept time with a shadow clock, and later they began to use a water clock.

5. Who were the time keepers
Time keepers were farmers, priests, and astronomers.

James Turrell

James Turrell's work involves the interaction of light and space. I thought that James Turrell's Roden Crater was an interesting concept; a means for a human to feel one with the entire atmosphere. A person can go inside the crater and view the sky from an elliptical shaped opening in the ceiling, allowing the veiwer only to see a minimal amount of space outside of the crater. A brilliant concept, indeed, although I think it would hardly be worth the "two mariages and one relationship" Turrell claims it costed him.