Camera Lucidas

The camera lucida was an optical device patented in 1806 by William Hyde Wollaston for use as a drawing aid among artists. While it seems that this was merely a reproduction of a device almost 200 years prior by Johannes Kepler, the loss of Kepler’s information left doubt and room for Wollaston to step in and patent the device. The camera lucida was a very basic device, and it seems that, with the minimal pieces involved, anyone who wanted to build a camera lucida could do so.

The idea of the camera lucida is to superimpose the subject being viewed optically onto the surface where the artist is drawing. In simplest form, the artist will look down at the drawing surface through a half-silvered mirror angled at 45 degrees, superimposing a direct view of the drawing beneath the surface and a reflected view of a scene horizontally in front of the artist. A weak negative lens creates a virtual image of the scene about the same distance as the drawing surface, allowing both to be viewed in good focus at the same time.

Because the artist can see both the scene around the individual as well as the drawing surface, it is much like a photographic double exposure. Now the artist has the ability to transfer various points of recognition from the scene to the drawing surface, making the drawing more accurate in terms of perspective. In fact, the artist has the option of simply tracing the objects within the scene should he or she so desire. Because of a washout experience occurring with white paper, many users have in the past chosen to work with black paper and a white pencil.

You can still find a camera lucida for sale today, if you know where to look. They are typically available through art supply chains and channels, though they are not widely acknowledged and are little understood among the art world today. In fact, the most common instance of camera lucida sales is among microscopists.

Part of the reason that these are not often sold to standard artists anymore is because the price is not worth the trouble for something that many artists consider to be an antiquated device. Although a camera lucida price will not leave you penniless, it is a bit high, considered a novelty in many instances except for the basic models used in science. Even in these applications, photoscopics have obliterated much of the use of these devices.