by Richard Born
I remember as a youngster making a camera obscura to view a solar eclipse. In fact this probably was the origin of my interest in astronomy. It recently occurred to me that many of our homes are filled with cameras obscura.<o:p></o:p>
The attached image shows how sunlight peaking through holes in a window blind cast numerous images of the sun on the door across the room. As a former high school science teacher, I also remember having my students measure the size of their solar images from their cameras obscura, and through knowing the distance to the sun and using a little geometry of proportional triangles, computing the diameter of the sun.<o:p></o:p>
Maybe this would bring back memories to the older readers of Astronomy Newsletter or encourage an interest in astronomy by your young readers.<o:p></o:p>
Image specifications: Simple composite of two photos taken with a Canon Digital Rebel XT<o:p></o:p>