Category: News

Yesterday Jenny and I attended the opening of Gerard Byrne's exhibition at the Mead Gallery within the Warwick Arts Centre. The centrepiece, a new work called Jielemeguvvie guvvie sjisjnjeli – Film inside an image, is quite spectacular and well worth a visit.

Alongside the exhibition is an educational room curated by Jo Gane looking at the history of photography, and we were asked to build a small camera obscura for drawing on. We'd been wanting to make a new camera so gladly took up this modest commission.

Here it is in situ, next to Kerry Leslie's diagram (who is also under the cover).

We used an old cabinet donated by a neighbour and neatly cut a hole in the front and top. The front has a +2 close-up lens (twice as strong as the one in our big camera) which focusses at about 50cm away. The top has a thick piece of frosted plastic which captures the image from behind allowing you to place tracing paper over it and make a drawing. Inside the cabinet is a mirror at 45 degrees.

Like all cameras that are made from scratch, it's an experiment that we didn't completely know would work until it was installed in the gallery, but we're happy with it. Where it fails is with the internal lighting which is only just bright enough, but were it moved outside it would be perfect. The view is also a little low, capturing people's legs rather than their heads, but that can be fixed by raising the camera up a couple of steps, or people crouching down.

But it works, and everyone is pleased, so we're pleased. Not bad for a week's work!

The exhibition is on for three months with our camera in situ throughout. We'll also be bringing the big camera to Warwick during half term on Tuesday Feb 16th for the afternoon and running build-your-own workshops as part of a week of activities. Hope to see you there!

(Slightly late now) Festive Greetings from Jenny and Pete

Happy New Year!
Firstly we’d like to say a big Thank You to all of those who have supported us this year, from being part of the Kickstarter campaign in late 2014 which allowed us to actually build the new camera in 2015, to those of you who visited us at events, took an interest, who spread the word, hired us for an event, applied to our artist callout or attended a workshop (and the rest). And also to Arts Council England for funding our next phase!

We hope you all had a good festive break. Here’s to 2016 being just as exciting.

2015 in summary:

January – March

We started the year with moving into BOM after successfully raising enough money through our Kicktstarter campaign to build a new camera. Tim at Pinhole Solutions then kindly donated the lens housing to us and we started talking to Matt Moore about building the wooden structure of the camera. In March we held a workshop for Flatpack and had a window installation of mini camera obscuras at Home Deli.

April-June

In late April we received the finished wooden sections from Carpenter Matt. In May we posted a callout to artists to get involved with the camera obscura and were delighted with the response. In June we took the camera out to Digbeth First Friday and setup by the canal. This was a test run as it wasn’t quite finished, but great to get out in public again.

July-Sept

Outings outings outings.

July 4th: CoCoMad

July 3-12th: Moseley Festival. Installation of two miniature camera obscuras in the garden at Maison Mayci for the duration of the festival.

July 18th: Jewellery Quarter Festival.

Aug 18th & 19th: Kirkby workshops

Aug 29th: Moseley Bog with Birmingham & Black Country Wildlife Trust

September 1st: Stirchley Community Market

Oct-Dec

October 10th: Winterbourne House and Gardens

October 17th: Highbury Harvest

In October we made our first official school visit, to Lyndon in Solihull, and it was ace. Speaking of ace, we also received confirmation of Arts Council funding in October, supporting a 6 month R&D process over the winter months with our 5 chosen artists.

So what does 2016 hold?

• Workshops and other collaborations with Winterbourne House and Gardens
• The artistic outcomes of the artist R&D with our famous five.
• Workshops and an exhibition of the artists’ process at Bom
• Workshop and involvement with Warwick Arts Centre
• Capture Birmingham

See you next year!

Jenny and Pete

bhamobscura.com

Last weekend, Oct 17th we went to Highbury Harvest at Highbury Park, Kings Heath. As it turns out, this was the last Camera Obscura public outing this year. The event had a lovely community atmosphere and we were situated right by the main path where footfall was good, as people were moving towards the 'main event'.

We also tried something a bit different, we had the mini camera obscuras with us anyway as they were still in the car from our school visit, so we decided to hang them in the trees nearby. This worked out as a great way to demonstrate the way that the camera obscura works in a simpler way on a smaller scale, and away from the crowd.

It was a bit gloomy, although dry, at first, but for a few hours mid afternoon we had some glorious autumnal blue sunshine.

Thanks to the organisers of this event for inviting us along after seeing us in the Jewellery Quarter!

This is the last public outing for the Camera Obscura this year, so if you know of any event happening next year which we should attend, then please get in touch!

Last Wednesday we visited Lyndon School in Solihull to show their students the Camera Obscura.

This was the result of a conversation we had over the summer at CoCoMad, with Mr Spurr, a teacher at the school who took a shine to the device when he saw it at the family festival. Although we've had a lot of different conversations about going into schools, this was the first that actually came to fruition..

We ended up showing the device to several different classes: Year 7 Science, Year 7 History, Year 9 Art & Design and GCSE Photography. We gave a short talk about the project and camera obscuras, and then let the students see for themselves, whilst their classmates waved through the camera.

Year 7 @LyndonScience using the handheld #cameraobscura courtesy of @BhamObscura at @LyndonSchool this morning pic.twitter.com/GqKfOi5WgO

— The Switch (@LyndonSwitch) October 14, 2015

A fantastic day @lyndonschool with @BhamObscura exploring #photography origins & concepts #light #cameras #images A photo posted by Mr Spurr @LyndonSwitch (@lyndonswitch) on Oct 14, 2015 at 7:48am PDT

It was really interesting seeing the different reactions from a ranges of students and hearing the questions that they came up with for us.

We had some great feedback from the staff, and one of the students even said 'This is actually good'  so we count that as a success!

The schools offer is one of many things we are hoping to develop as part of the Arts Council Funding we had confirmation of last week so this will hopefully be the first of many.

The big news of today is we've been successful in applying for some Arts Council funding. A few months ago we announced an Open Call for artists to create new work with the Kickstarter funded camera obscura. The successful applicants were added to a Grant for the Arts submission for £10,800 over six months. We now have that money.

This means a number of things can happen, some of which might not be obvious.

The main one is five artworks / performances will emerge in the Spring of next year using our camera obscura. You can read the submitted ideas but be aware they will undergo substantial development over the winter!

The other main thing is Jenny and Pete are now employed by Birmingham Camera Obscura for six months earning £500 a month each. While on paper this is to manage the funded R&D activity, in reality it means we'll be able to dedicate significant time to the project as a whole and do the things we've had to put off in order to pay the rent. No more squeezing camera obscura work into our spare time. (The first priority will be sorting out the remaining Kickstarter rewards because that's just getting embarrassing!)

Other things that will happen:

• More updates on the website. We need to document our activities and write more blog posts.
• Creation of an educational workshop package for schools. We had a good visit this week to Lyndon School whose teachers are keen to help us develop it into something
  we can take to schools across Birmingham.
• Consolidation and development of our resources. We've collected a lot of knowledge about camera obscuras over the last couple of years and need to sort it out, alongside the research our five artists will be undertaking.
• Development of a touring program for 2016. We've set aside some funds for consultation on how best to tour the camera, and the works developed for it, locally, nationally and internationally. We need to get it out there more frequently and more sustainably than we managed this year.
• Finishing bits of the camera. We always intended to give it some wheels and it needs to be more weather proof. We can get on with that now.
• Being more available at BOM and elsewhere. Alongside some formal workshops and open days for this specific project we're going to be available for people to come visit to discuss camera obscuras or just catch up with what we're doing.
• And plenty more which hasn't come to mind just now!

If the Kickstarter was Stage Two of this project, then this feels like Stage Three, a major change in how we do things and laying some solid foundations for the future. Thanks as ever to everyone who's supported us to date, from giving a bit of cash to offering advice and wisdom. May there be many more stages!

Weather permitting (and it's currently looking at bit iffy) the camera obscura will be set up at Highbury Park, between Kings Heath and Stirchley, for their harvest celebration of five years of community gardening. It'll be a lovely afternoon regardless and well worth popping along to if you're local.

We expect to be set up in the middle of the park, at the play area up from the car park. If you follow the main path you'll find us!

As always check Twitter if you're coming to see us specially. If the weather looks really dodgy we may cancel.

Over the next few days we're undertaking a tour of South Birmingham! Jenny's not sure it constitutes a real tour but Pete's convinced that if we load the camera into a car and go to three separate venues before taking it back to BOM it's a real tour, like what rock bands do. So there.

Saturday we'll be at Moseley Bog alongside the Mini Beasts and Bugs event from 1-4pm.

Sunday afternoon Pete's going to set up the camera at Hazelwell Allotments next to Hazelwell Park in Stirchley, where his wife has a plot, and mess around with it for an hour or so. It's not an official event so check the Twitter for when he's there and give him a ring on 07775 690106 if the gates are locked.

Monday we don't have anything planned. Any ideas?

Tuesday we're at Stirchley Community Market from 4-8pm, held in the garden of the delightful British Oak Pub on Pershore Road. The market has food and crafts from local small traders and is always a delight.

And then it's back to BOM.

Hope to see some of you!

The Bham Obscura outing to the first Jewellery Quarter Festival was the first time I (Jenny) had done this without Pete. Last year, Pete took the camera to Warwick Bar Summer Fete without me, as I was on holiday, but other than that we have always taken the camera out together.

This was a great exercise as to how I would manage without him. We do try and work together as collaboratively as we can, and try not to be too prescriptive with our roles. Having said that, when it comes to lugging around large pieces of wood, much easier when Pete’s there!

The first challenge was actually transporting the kit, which Dan Burwood helped out with, with his large van. The second challenge was recruiting somebody to help out on the day, as a second body. Luckily Kerry Leslie, my good chum and sometimes colleague, eagerly said yes when I asked her a few weeks ago! Sorted.

Then came the day, we loaded up the van at Bom at early am and headed over cheerfully to the Jewellery Quarter Festival site. It was then, when unloading the van I realised I’d forgotten our brand new, shiny silver curtain: shucks. Rang Kerry and she brought it on her way into town thankfully, but in the meantime I used a tarp we always take out in case of showers! The corner I chose to set up on was extremely windy so there were moments when the sides of the camera were acting as sails in the wind. With a *little* help just lifting the heavier pieces onto the top of the structure, we were BUILT.

The festival had a lovely atmosphere and was well organised by the JQ Bid team. There was lots going on and a good crowd came through around lunchtime for several hours. We had some interesting conversations and also saw some familiar faces. We even had some coppers have a look, as well as the festival security. It wasn't as busy as CoCoMad as it was a very different event, but really glad we were invited along.

Moseley Festival / CoCoMad

On the morning before CoCoMad, we installed two small camera obscuras in the garden of Maison Mayci on Moseley High St. This was quite a surreal experience, at pre-9am on a Saturday morning (Pete nor me are morning people) we asked the café staff it was alright to go through to the garden, and we just went and hung two mini cameras up! It was a beautiful morning and a very peaceful spot.

Then off we popped round the corner to CoCoMad.

CoCoMad was our first official outing with the newly built camera, shiny curtain and all! It is definitely a different setup process to that of the old camera. With this one, as it doesn’t have wheels, you really have to think about how you position the camera, in order to optimize the view, how visible it is to passing foot fall, and also so it’s safe (ie not on a steep hill so it slides off its tables base).

We had a HUGE number of visitors. We took 100 flyers with us and gave them all out, so we estimate 300 + people came to visit the camera. Friends and families all came along and peered in. Kiddies came and looked, then went and brought their friends back.

We had some fab conversations with people from all sorts of backgrounds, who gave us some interesting ideas, let us know about other cameras they had seen, gave us some tips on how we could improve it, advised us where to take it..etc..

We stayed for a good long day and left along with all the slightly sun worn visitors. A good day was had, thanks CoCoMad.

Also, big thanks to Fi for the photos of us doing our thing!

This Saturday we'll be bringing the new camera obscura, crowd-funded through Kickstarter in December, to Cotteridge Park near Bournville, to meet the public for the very first time at the CoCoMad festival. It's been quite a rollercoaster of a half-year but here we are with a fully functional portable camera obscura. Yay!

As we write this on Tuesday we have a couple of things left to do. The electrics for the mirror rotation motors are functional but a bit of a mess, so we'll be breaking out the soldering iron and tidying them up. We also need to collect the banner which Gareth finished yesterday. So if you're at CoCoMad look out for this:

It's three metres wide and designed to work in thirds when wrapped around the camera or, if we have a stall or something, as a backdrop. And the text explains the history, science and art of the camera obscura along with a bit about this project.

Of course, like anything important the launch day is simply the beginning. Now we have to give the camera the audience it deserves and get it out as much as possible. If you can help with this, either by giving us contacts and referrals for busy public events or simply hosting the camera yourself, please get in touch with Jenny.

And while getting people to look inside the camera and seeing their big grins when they come out is amazing, it's important the camera does not become a novelty. We have many thoughts on using the camera obscura as a 21st century artistic tool but we need more. Our current Open Call is the start of this and we're always open to ideas. Contact either of us if you have a good one.

But for now we look forward to seeing some of you at Cotteridge Park from 12 noon on Saturday 4th July, showing you the camera you helped build and thanking you very very much.