Halifax artist creates giant 'camera obscura'
A Halifax artist’s candid creation is capturing the attention of everyone who gets a chance to see it.
An Milne’s love of photography led the Halifax artist to create something big.
“It became this way of creating this unexpected experience for people,” Milne said.
Armed with wood working skills from high school, Milne’s artistic alchemy led to the creation of a giant camera - and it’s not the first big camera the artist has made.
“I felt like building a really large camera would create this amazing public spectacle,” Milne said.
Constructed of oak and a lens bought at a Winnipeg flea market for $100 - the project is a ‘camera obscura,’ a basic principle of optics that even predates photography.
“I was interested in the sense of photography, and its attachment to physical artifact. With the big camera, there was this idea that I could be inside the camera and interact with the photograph directly, pushing and pulling with what is a photograph,” Milne said.
Camera obscura is essentially a dark room, where light passes through the lens and projects the outside world onto the wall creating a 4X5 large format image.
“The images that you make inside the camera, you can put up a sheet of film and record a photograph like you normally would, but you can also put up a piece of paper and trace, draw and interact with the images that are projected,” said Milne.
Milne says the most unexpected part of the project has been the public interaction.
The artist encourages spectators to climb inside the camera themselves to get the full experience.
“The work became as much about the public interaction as it did about making the photographs," Milne said. "They’ll climb inside the camera and have this crazy experience.”
Contrary to its name, camera obscura is giving people a shared experience they will certainly remember.
Milne's work can be found online.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
'I just can't believe that it took so long': Body found in wreckage 3 months after deadly fire
A man accused of arson in a January Old Strathcona apartment fire is expected to be charged with manslaughter after a body was discovered in the burned building late last month.
No proof man lied to brother about number of kittens born in litter, B.C. tribunal rules
A man was denied a $5,000 payout from his brother after a B.C. tribunal dismissed his claim disputing how many kittens were born in a litter.
Quebec police hand out hundreds of tickets to Hells Angels and other bikers before 'first run' meeting
Quebec provincial police handed out hundreds of fines to Hells Angels members and other supporting motorcycle clubs who met for their 'first run' in a small town near Sherbrooke, Que.
Explosion at train station leads to discovery of stolen car on Montreal's South Shore: police
Police are investigating after a BMW exploded in the St-Lambert Exo train station parking lot on Montreal's South Shore.
A Chinese driver is praised for helping reduce casualties in a highway collapse that killed 48
A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country's mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
Snakes almost on a plane: U.S. TSA discovers a bag with small snakes in passenger's pants
According to an X post by the Transportation Security Administration, officers at the Miami International Airport found the small bag of snakes hidden in a passenger's trousers on April 26 at a checkpoint.
Russia puts Ukrainian President Zelenskyy on its wanted list
Russia has put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on its wanted list, Russian state media reported Saturday, citing the interior ministry’s database.
A candidate for Germany's key party was beaten up while campaigning for European elections
A candidate for Chancellor Olaf Scholz's center-left party in next month's election for the European Parliament was beaten up and seriously injured while campaigning in an eastern city, the party said Saturday.
Grandparents killed in wrong-way crash on Hwy. 401 identified
A 60-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman killed in a wrong-way crash on Highway 401 earlier this week have been identified by the Consulate General of India in Toronto.