Arts
The fascinating story of camera obscura
Camera obscura, the forerunner of photography, gives a peep into how photography grew, and the slow but exciting steps it had to take before it could turn into the reality that we know

I was working on a short essay meant to introduce the work of the Daniells — Thomas, the uncle, and his young nephew, William, — who produced what is still regarded as among the finest series of ‘Views of India’ of its kind: Oriental Scenery. The remarkably gifted twosome, both painters — ‘engravers’ is how they were described as in fact, in official documents — arrived at Calcutta in 1786, toured the country from the north to the south, constantly sketching and painting the vast and changing landscapes of our land and its great monuments: intact or lying in ruins. And when they went back to their home country, England, they produced this extraordinary series in six volumes, consisting of 144 lavishly coloured aquatints, which took their countrymen by storm and soon turned into collectors’ items. Of that series, however, another time: perhaps when the book, which is under production, comes out. Here I wish to turn to a detail that intrigued me while going over the material that I had gathered for that essay: that a constant companion of theirs throughout the eight years of travel in India was that wonderful invention: a camera obscura.

“Officer and Laughing Girl”. Painting byJohannes Vermeer, ca. 1655. The Frick Collection, New York

Engraving illustrating different types of camera obscura. From Alexandre Severien, Universal Dictionary of Mathematics and Physics

A view of Ramgarh in Uttar Pradesh. By Thomas and William Daniell, ca. 1790

In our own age, when photography is part of everyone’s daily experience and the most sophisticated of cameras can be picked up almost on the roadside, one forgets the story of how photography grew, and the slow but exciting steps it had to take before it could turn into the reality that we know. The camera obscura is very much a part of that story. The term was coined by the great astronomer, Johannes Kepler, in 1604, and "Dark chamber" is what the two Latin words mean. One has to know a bit of physics to understand how that ‘chamber’ — to begin with almost a whole darkened room, but gradually miniaturised to turn into a relatively small box not difficult to carry around — worked.

Briefly put, it works on the principle that ‘if a small hole is made in the wall of a completely darkened room, an inverted image of the scene outside the window will be produced on the opposite wall of the room.’ This is due to the fact that light travels in a straight line and when it passes through the hole and strikes the surface inside, the image appears.

There are histories that tell you of how the optical principle was understood in very early times — the names of Aristotle, the Chinese philosopher, Mo-zi, an Arabian scholar, Al-Kindi, crop up — but it was in the 17th century when box-sized cameras began to be made that painters seem to have woken up to the enormous possibilities that this device of wonder opened up for their work. For the image that was thus produced kept the perspective of the object outside intact, and could be projected onto paper and then traced to produce a highly accurate representation.

Painters of great distinction, Canaletto and Joshua Reynolds among others in the 18th century, are known to have made use of the device for recording stunning details of far-off objects or monuments. It was not surprising then that the Daniells carried the device with them when they landed in India. Without recourse to it, one can make out, they would not have found it easy to produce the lush, velvety detail that one sees in their work or the near-perfect perspective: those views by the ghats of rivers, distant forts atop hills, mouldering ruins of once magnificent monuments, vast vistas of land stretching out till as far as the eye can travel.

In the paintings they made in India, one does not see in the incidental details the camera obscura among the furniture and equipment they lugged around in their travels — even though a telescope, a specially built tripod, a large album cover etc., do figure here and there — but one does come upon an occasional reference to it in the journal that William Daniell kept. The device must have been invaluable.

It is not unlikely that even when using the camera obscura to ‘devastating effect’, many painters must have been reluctant to admit to the use of this ‘predecessor of the photographic camera’ as it is often called.

But as one reads more about it, one comes upon a major controversy centering, especially upon Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675): one of the greatest of Dutch painters, the one who made the famous Portrait of the Girl with a Pearl Ear-ring.

The question is: did he or did he not use a camera obscura for his work? In fact, was he a pioneer among painters to have used it? No proof exists, and no references can be found.

It is the extraordinary detail, and the ‘photographic perspective’ one sees in work after work of his, down to the maps on the wall in the background in many of his paintings, that leads art historians and scholars of the history of photography to raise this question. Philip Steadman, Professor at the University College, London, who wrote a whole book,Vermeer’s Camera, in 2001, has devoted years to finding the answer. Consider one of his many observations or, shall one say, arguments. In one of Vermeerother famous paintings – Officer and Laughing Girl – he says, "the two figures sit very close across the corner of the table. But the image of the officer's head is about twice as wide as that of the smiling girl. The perspective is perfectly correct in a geometrical sense: the discrepancy arises because the viewpoint of the picture is close to the soldier." And then he goes on to add:"We are quite familiar today with foreground objects appearing very large in snapshots. But in 17th-century painting this is rather unusual, and Vermeer's contemporaries would have made human figures in a composition of this kind much more nearly equal in size."

Again, he refers to the maps that one sees in Vermeer’s paintings, including the one in Officer and Laughing Girl, and says that these are real maps. But adds the comment: " …it is immediately obvious that Vermeer has copied it extremely faithfully - but was this done through the use of a camera obscura?" At which point, after asking the question, he goes into highly complex details involving geometry, reflections of light on objects in the room, soft and sharp focus etc. At the end of it all, Steadman makes the case out that Vermeer did use a camera obscura but is not sure that everyone would agree. His book, he says, "has managed to win over many art historians, including some who were previously extremely sceptical about camera obscura theories". But then, in fairness, adds: "A small core of Vermeer specialists remains, however, to be convinced." Perhaps that is the way it should be.

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