Architectural Indigestion: The almost obsessive need to live in a "cool" architectural environment. Frequently related objects of fetish include framed black-and-white art photography (Diane Arbus a favorite); simplistic pine furniture; matte black high-tech items such as TVs, stereos, and telephones; low-wattage ambient lighting; a lamp, chair, or table that alludes to the 1950s; cut flowers with complex names. -- Douglas Coupland, "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture"
The Third Law of Photography: If you did manage to get any good shots, they will be ruined when someone inadvertently opens the darkroom door and all of the dark leaks out.
FORTUNE DISCUSSES THE OBSCURE FILMS: #12 O.E.D.: David Lean, 1969, 3 hours 30 min. Lean's version of the Oxford Dictionary has been accused of shallowness in its treatment of a complete work. Omar Sharif tends to overact as aardvark, but Alec Guiness is solid in the role of abbacy. As usual, the photography is stunning. With Julie Christie.
"'Photography is one of my hobbies,' said he. 'I have made my dark room up there. But, dear me! what an observant young lady we have come upon. Who would have believed it? Who would have ever believed it?' He spoke in a jesting tone, but there was no jest in his eyes as he looked at me. I read suspicion there and annoyance, but no jest.
There is a strong link between synesthesia and photographic memory (technically called eidetic memory) or at least heightened memory (hypermnesis). Many synesthetes used their synesthesia as a mnemonic aid.
"Had there been women in the house, I should have suspected a mere vulgar intrigue. That, however, was out of the question. The man's business was a small one, and there was nothing in his house which could account for such elaborate preparations, and such an expenditure as they were at. It must, then, be something out of the house. What could it be? I thought of the assistant's fondness for photography, and his trick of vanishing into the cellar. The cellar! There was the end of this tangled clue. Then I made inquiries as to this mysterious assistant and found that I had to deal with one of the coolest and most daring criminals in London. He was doing something in the cellar--something which took many hours a day for months on end. What could it be, once more? I could think of nothing save that he was running a tunnel to some other building.
"Oh, he has his faults, too," said Mr. Wilson. "Never was such a fellow for photography. Snapping away with a camera when he ought to be improving his mind, and then diving down into the cellar like a rabbit into its hole to develop his pictures. That is his main fault, but on the whole he's a good worker. There's no vice in him."
I am intrigued with scriptural mythology that tells us that God created a divine feminine presence to dwell amongst humanity. This concept has had a constant influence on the work. I have imagined her as ubiquitous, watchful, and often in motion. This work is, in effect, the photographic image of the invisible.
The chloride, CdCl_2, bromide, CdBr_2, and iodide, CdI_2, are also known, cadmium iodide being sometimes used in photography, as it is one of the few iodides which are soluble in alcohol. Cadmium chloride and iodide have been shown to behave in an anomalous way in aqueous solution (W. Hittorf, _Pogg. Ann._, 1859, 106, 513), probably owing to the formation of complex ions; the abnormal behaviour apparently diminishing as the solution becomes more and more dilute, until, at very high dilutions the salts are ionized in the normal manner. Entry: CADMIUM
The year 1784 marks the beginning of the ordnance survey, for in that year Major-General Roy measured a base line of 27,404 ft. on Hounslow Heath. Six additional base lines were measured up to 1849, including the Lough Foyle, in 1827-1828, and that on Salisbury Plain, in 1849. The primary triangulation was only completed in 1858, but in the meantime, in 1791, the detail survey had begun. At first it was merely intended to produce a map sufficiently accurate on a scale of 1 in. to a mile (1:63,360). Ireland having been surveyed (1824-1842) on a scale of 6 in. to a mile (1:10,560), it was determined in 1840, after the whole of England and Wales, with the exception of Lancashire and Yorkshire, had been completed on one-inch scales, to adopt that scale for the whole of the United Kingdom. Finally, in 1854, a cadastral survey of the whole of the United Kingdom, only excepting uncultivated districts, was resolved upon, on a scale of 1:2500, still larger scales (1:500 or 1:1000) being adopted for town plans. Parish boundaries are laid down with the help of local meresmen appointed by justices at quarter sessions. The horizontal contours are based upon instrumental measurement, and as a whole these ordnance maps were undoubtedly superior in accuracy, with rare exceptions, to similar maps published by foreign governments. Even though the hill hachures on the older one-inch maps are not quite satisfactory, this deficiency is in a large measure compensated for by the presence of absolutely trustworthy contours. Originally the maps were engraved on copper, and the progress of publication was slow; but since the introduction of modern processes, such as electrotyping (in 1840), photography (in 1855) and zincography (in 1859), it has been rapid. A plan, the engraving of which formerly took two years, can now be produced in two days. Entry: AUTHORITIES
DRAWING, in art. Although the verb "to draw" has various meanings, the substantive _drawing_ is confined by usage to its artistic sense, delineation or design. The word "draw," from a root common to the Teutonic languages (Goth, _dragan_, O.H.G. _drahan_, Mod. Ger. _tragen_, which all have the sense of "carry," O. Norse _draga_, A.S. _drazan_, _drazen_, "draw," cf. Lat. _trahere_), means to pull or "drag" (a word of the same origin) as distinct from the action of pushing. It is thus used of traction generally, whether by men, animals or machines. The same idea is preserved in "drawing" as applied to the fine arts. We do not usually say, or think, that a sculptor is drawing when he is using his chisel, although he may be expressing or defining forms, nor that an engraver is drawing when he is pushing the burin with the palm of the hand, although the result may be the rendering of a design. But we do say that an artist is drawing when he uses the lead pencil, and here we have a motion bearing some resemblance to that of traction generally. The action of the artist in drawing the pencil point with his fingers along the paper is analogous, e.g., to that of a horse or man drawing a pole over soft ground and leaving a mark behind. The same analogy may be observed between two of the senses in which the French verb _tirer_ is frequently employed. This word, the origin of which is quite uncertain, was formerly used by good writers in the two senses of the verb to draw. Thus Lafontaine says, "Six forts chevaux _tiraient_ un coche"; and Caillières wrote, "Il n'y a pas longtemps que je me suis fait _tirer_ par Rigaud," meaning that Rigaud had drawn or painted his portrait. At the present day the verb _tirer_ has fallen into disuse amongst cultivated Frenchmen with regard to drawing and painting, but it is still universally used for all kinds of design and even for photography by the common people. The cultivated use it still for printing, as for example "cette gravure sera tirée à cent exemplaires," in the sense of pulling. A verb much more nearly related to the English verb _to draw_ is the French _traire_ (Lat. _trahere_), which has _trait_ for its past participle. _Traire_ is now used exclusively for milking cows and other animals, and though the analogy between this and artistic drawing is not obvious at first, nevertheless there is a certain analogy of motion, since the hand passing down the teat draws the milk downwards. The word _trait_ is much more familiar in connexion with art as "les traits du visage," the natural markings of the face, and it is very often used in a figurative sense, as we say "traits of character." It is familiar in the English _portrait_, derived from _protrahere_. The ancient Romans used words which expressed more clearly the conception that drawing was done in line (_delineare_) or in shade (_adumbrare_), though there are reasons for believing that the words were often indiscriminately applied. Although the modern Italians have both _traire_ and _trarre_, they use _delineare_ still in the sense of artistic drawing, and also _adombrare_. The Greek verb [Greek: graphein] appears in English in "graphic" and in many compounds, such as photograph, &c. It is worth observing that the Greeks seem to have considered drawing and writing (q.v.) as essentially the same process, since they used the same word for both. This points to the early identity of the two arts when drawing was a kind of writing, and when such writing as men had learned to practise was essentially what we should call drawing, though of a rude and simple kind. Even in the present day picture writing is not unfrequently resorted to by travellers as a means of making themselves intelligible. There is also a kind of art which is writing in the modern sense and drawing at the same time, such as the work of the medieval illuminators in their manuscripts. (X.) Entry: DRAWING
The modern cinematograph was rendered possible by the invention of the celluloid roll film (employed by Marey in 1890), on which the serial pictures are impressed by instantaneous photography, a long sensitized film being moved across the focal plane of a camera and exposed intermittently. In one apparatus for making the exposures a cam jerks the film across the field once for each picture, the slack being gathered in on a drum at a constant rate. In another four lenses are rotated so as to give four images for each rotation, the film travelling so as to present a new portion in the field as each lens comes in place. Sixteen to fifty pictures may be taken per second. The films are developed on large drums, within which a ruby electric light may be fixed to enable the process to be watched. A positive is made from the negative thus obtained, and is passed through an optical lantern, the images being thus successively projected through an objective lens upon a distant screen. For an hour's exhibition 50,000 to 165,000 pictures are needed. To regulate the feed in the lantern a hole is punched in the film for each picture. These holes must be extremely accurate in position; when they wear the feed becomes irregular, and the picture dances or vibrates in an unpleasant manner. Another method of exhibiting cinematographic effects is to bind the pictures together in book form by one edge, and then release them from the other in rapid succession by means of the thumb or some mechanical device as the book is bent backwards. In this case the subject is viewed, not by projection, but directly, either with the unaided eye or through a magnifying glass. Entry: CINEMATOGRAPH
COPYING MACHINES. Appliances of various kinds have been devised for producing copies of writings made by the pen or pencil. A simple method commonly adopted when only a single copy is required is to write the original with specially prepared copying ink (formed by adding some thickening substance like sugar or gum to ordinary ink), to place upon it a damped sheet of thin absorbent paper, and to press the two together in some way, as in a copying press. The resulting impression, being reversed, must be read from the back of the absorbent paper, which is thin enough to be transparent. Another process, by which a considerable number of copies can be made simultaneously, consists in interleaving a number of sheets of thin white paper with sheets of paper prepared with lampblack ("carbon paper") and writing on the top sheet with a "style" or other sharp-pointed instrument. The hectograph may be taken as typical of manifolding processes analogous to lithography. In it the writing is in first instance done with aniline ink, and then a transfer is made to a plate of a gelatinous composition, from which a series of duplicates can be taken off. Another class of methods involves the preparation of what are essentially stencils. In the cyclostyle, paper of a special kind is stretched over a smooth metal plate, and the writing instrument consists of a holder having at the end a small wheel provided with a serrated edge on its periphery, which perforates the paper with lines of minute cuts and thus forms a stencil. When ink is passed over this stencil with a roller it goes through the perforations and leaves an impression on a piece of paper placed underneath. In the trypograph a similar result is attained by using a simple style for writing, but stretching the paper over a metal plate having its surface covered with fine sharp corrugations which pierce the paper as the style is moved over them. In the Edison electric pen the stencil is formed by the aid of a style containing a fine needle, which is rapidly moved up and down by a small electric motor mounted at the top of the pen, and thus a series of minute holes is punctured in the paper by the act of writing. For copying plans and drawings, engineers, architects, &c., use a "blue print" process which depends on the action of light on certain salts of iron (see SUN-COPYING and PHOTOGRAPHY). Entry: COPYING
Lovers of rustic festivity may hold that the poet's greatest performance is his narrative of "Halloween," which for easy vigour, fulness of rollicking life, blended truth and fancy, is unsurpassed in its kind. Campbell, Wilson, Hazlitt, Montgomery, Burns himself, and the majority of his critics, have [v.04 p.0859] recorded their preference for "Tam o' Shanter," where the weird superstitious element that has played so great a part in the imaginative work of this part of our island is brought more prominently forward. Few passages of description are finer than that of the roaring Doon and Alloway Kirk glimmering through the groaning trees; but the unique excellence of the piece consists in its variety, and a perfectly original combination of the terrible and the ludicrous. Like Goethe's _Walpurgis Nacht_, brought into closer contact with real life, it stretches from the drunken humours of Christopher Sly to a world of fantasies almost as brilliant as those of the _Midsummer Night's Dream_, half solemnized by the severer atmosphere of a sterner clime. The contrast between the lines "Kings may be blest," &c., and those which follow, beginning "But pleasures are like poppies spread," is typical of the perpetual antithesis of the author's thought and life, in which, at the back of every revelry, he sees the shadow of a warning hand, and reads on the wall the writing, _Omnia mutantur_. With equal or greater confidence other judges have pronounced Burns's masterpiece to be "The Jolly Beggars." Certainly no other single production so illustrates his power of exalting what is insignificant, glorifying what is mean, and elevating the lowest details by the force of his genius. "The form of the piece," says Carlyle, "is a mere cantata, the theme the half-drunken snatches of a joyous band of vagabonds, while the grey leaves are floating on the gusts of the wind in the autumn of the year. But the whole is compacted, refined and poured forth in one flood of liquid harmony. It is light, airy and soft of movement, yet sharp and precise in its details; every face is a portrait, and the whole a group in clear photography. The blanket of the night is drawn aside; in full ruddy gleaming light these rough tatterdemalions are seen at their boisterous revel wringing from Fate another hour of wassail and good cheer." Over the whole is flung a half-humorous, half-savage satire--aimed, like a two-edged sword, at the laws and the law-breakers, in the acme of which the graceless crew are raised above the level of ordinary gipsies, footpads and rogues, and are made to sit "on the hills like gods together, careless of mankind," and to launch their Titan thunders of rebellion against the world. Entry: O
DICK, THOMAS (1774-1857), Scottish writer on astronomy, was born at Dundee on the 24th of November 1774. The appearance of a brilliant meteor inspired him, when in his ninth year, with a passion for astronomy; and at the age of sixteen he forsook the loom, and supported himself by teaching. In 1794 he entered the university of Edinburgh, and set up a school on the termination of his course; then, in 1801, took out a licence to preach, and officiated for some years as probationer in the United Presbyterian church. From about 1807 to 1817 he taught in the secession school at Methven in Perthshire, and during the ensuing decade in that of Perth, where he composed his first substantive book, _The Christian Philosopher_ (1823, 8th ed. 1842). Its success determined his vocation as an author; he built himself, in 1827, a cottage at Broughty Ferry, near Dundee, and devoted himself wholly to literary and scientific pursuits. They proved, however, owing to his unpractical turn of mind, but slightly remunerative, and he was in 1847 relieved from actual poverty by a crown pension of £50 a year, eked out by a local subscription. He died on the 29th of July 1857. His best-known works are: _Celestial Scenery_ (1837), _The Sidereal Heavens_ (1840), and _The Practical Astronomer_ (1845), in which is contained (p. 204) a remarkable forecast of the powers and uses of celestial photography. Written with competent knowledge, and in an agreeable style, they obtained deserved and widespread popularity. Entry: DICK
An attempt should be made to explain the psycho-physiological process that must take place in the mind of the real draughtsman. When we look at an object in nature we know its length and breadth by the flat image on the retina; we see also the light and shade, which at once gives us a correct idea of the object's depth or relief. But we do not, nor could we, have this idea from the flat image on the retina alone, i.e. from the mere perception of the light and shade: our knowledge of its depth is the result of experience, i.e. of our having from infancy remarked a certain dispensation of light and shade on, and peculiar to, every form we have touched or traversed, and so, by association and inference, being early enabled to have ideas of the depth of things by their various arrangements of lights and darks without having to touch or traverse them. Nevertheless the act (generally, but by no means always, an unconscious one) of visually touching a form must necessarily take place before we can apprehend the third dimension of a form. It is, then, by the combination of the ideas derived from pure vision and the ideas derived from touch that we know the length, breadth and depth of a solid form. We have shown that the art of drawing is not an imitation, but an expression of the artist's ideas of form; therefore all drawing of forms that merely reproduces the image on the retina, and leaves unconsulted the ideas of touch, is incomplete and primitive, because it does not express a conception of form which is the result of an association of the two senses; in other words, it does not contain an idea of the object's relief or solidity. And all teaching of drawing that does not impress upon the student the necessity of combining the sense of vision with that of touch is erroneous, for it is thereby limiting him to a mechanical task, viz. the tracing of the flat image on the retina, which could be equally well done by mechanical means, or by photography alone. Entry: FIG
HUNT, ROBERT (1807-1887), English natural philosopher, was born at Devonport on the 6th of September 1807. His father, a naval officer, was drowned while Robert was a youth. He began to study in London for the medical profession, but ill-health caused him to return to the west of England, and in 1840 he became secretary to the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society at Falmouth. Here he was brought into contact with Robert Were Fox, and carried on some physical and chemical investigations with him. He took up photography with great zeal, following Daguerre's discovery, and introducing new processes. His _Manual of Photography_ (1841, ed. 5, 1857) was the first English treatise on the subject. He also experimented generally on the action of light, and published _Researches on Light_ (1844). In 1845 he accepted the invitation of Sir Henry de la Beche to become keeper of mining records at the Museum of Economic (afterwards "Practical") Geology, and when the school of mines was established in 1851 he lectured for two years on mechanical science, and afterwards for a short time on experimental physics. His principal work was the collection and editing of the _Mineral Statistics_ of the United Kingdom, and this he continued to the date of his retirement (1883), when the mining record office was transferred to the Home Office. He was elected F.R.S. in 1854. In 1884 he published a large volume on _British Mining_, in which the subject was dealt with very fully from an historical as well as a practical point of view. He also edited the fifth and some later editions of Ure's _Dictionary of Arts, Mines and Manufactures_. He died in London on the 17th of October 1887. A mineralogical museum at Redruth has been established in his memory. Entry: HUNT
The process of augmenting the resultant illumination at a particular point by stopping some of the secondary rays may be carried much further (Soret, _Pogg. Ann._, 1875, 156, p. 99). By the aid of photography it is easy to prepare a plate, transparent where the zones of odd order fall, and opaque where those of even order fall. Such a plate has the power of a condensing lens, and gives an illumination out of all proportion to what could be obtained without it. An even greater effect (fourfold) can be attained by providing that the stoppage of the light from the alternate zones is replaced by a phase-reversal without loss of amplitude. R. W. Wood (_Phil. Mag._, 1898, 45, p 513) has succeeded in constructing zone plates upon this principle. Entry: _
In reviewing the progress of geographical discovery thus far, it has been possible to keep fairly closely to a chronological order. But in the 19th century and after exploring work was so generally and steadily maintained in all directions, and was in so many cases narrowed down from long journeys to detailed surveys within relatively small areas, that it becomes desirable to cover the whole period at one view for certain great divisions of the world. (See AFRICA; ASIA; AUSTRALIA; POLAR REGIONS; &c.) Here, however, may be noticed the development of geographical societies devoted to the encouragement of exploration and research. The first of the existing geographical societies was that of Paris, founded in 1825 under the title of La Société de Géographie. The Berlin Geographical Society (Gesellschaft für Erdkunde) is second in order of seniority, having been founded in 1827. The Royal Geographical Society, which was founded in London in 1830, comes third on the list; but it may be viewed as a direct result of the earlier African Association founded in 1788. Sir John Barrow, Sir John Cam Hobhouse (Lord Broughton), Sir Roderick Murchison, Mr Robert Brown and Mr Bartle Frere formed the foundation committee of the Royal Geographical Society, and the first president was Lord Goderich. The action of the society in supplying practical instruction to intending travellers, in astronomy, surveying and the various branches of science useful to collectors, has had much to do with advancement of discovery. Since the war of 1870 many geographical societies have been established on the continent of Europe. At the close of the 19th century there were upwards of 100 such societies in the world, with more than 50,000 members, and over 150 journals were devoted entirely to geographical subjects.[11] The great development of photography has been a notable aid to explorers, not only by placing at their disposal a faithful and ready means of recording the features of a country and the types of inhabitants, but by supplying a method of quick and accurate topographical surveying. Entry: PROGRESS
The first specimen of a reflecting telescope was constructed by Isaac Newton in 1668. It was of what is still called "Newtonian" design, and had a speculum 2 in. in diameter. Through the skill of John Hadley (1682-1743) and James Short of Edinburgh (1710-1768) the instrument unfolded, in the ensuing century, some of its capabilities, which the labours of William Herschel enormously enhanced. Between 1774 and 1789 he built scores of specula of continually augmented size, up to a diameter of 4 ft., the optical excellence of which approved itself by a crowd of discoveries. Uranus (q.v.) was recognized by its disk on the 13th of March 1781; two of its satellites, Oberon and Titania, disclosed themselves on the 11th of January 1787; while with the giant 48-in. mirror, used on the "front-view" plan, Mimas and Enceladus, the innermost Saturnian moons, were brought to view on the 28th of August and the 17th of September 1789. These were incidental trophies; Herschel's main object was the exploration of the sidereal heavens. The task, though novel and formidable, was executed with almost incredible success. Charles Messier (1730-1817) had catalogued in 1781 103 nebulae; Herschel discovered 2500, laid down the lines of their classification, divined the laws of their distribution, and assigned their place in a scheme of development. The proof supplied by him in 1802 that coupled stars mutually circulate threw open a boundless field of research; and he originated experimental inquiries into the construction of the heavens by systematically collecting and sifting stellar statistics. He, moreover, definitively established, in 1783, the fact and general direction of the sun's movement in space, and thus introduced an element of order into the maze of stellar proper motions. Sir John Herschel continued in the northern, and extended to the southern hemisphere, his father's work. The third earl of Rosse mounted, at Parsonstown in 1845, a speculum 6 ft. in diameter, which afforded the first indications of the spiral structure shown in recent photographs to be the most prevalent characteristic of nebulae. Down to near the close of the 19th century, both the use and the improvement of reflectors were left mainly in British hands; but the gift of the "Crossley" instrument in 1895, to the Lick observatory, and its splendid subsequent performances in nebular photography, brought similar tools of research into extensive use among American astronomers; and they are now, for many of the various purposes of astrophysics, strongly preferred to refractors. Entry: G