What is it

What is Solargraphy

Solargraphy is the art of capturing the sun’s path with a homemade pinhole camera.It is a form of extremely long exposure photography, each can-camera producing only one photo for the entire time it is out. The cameras are made from any lightproof container, usually a soup tin or something similar (see example below). Inside is a single sheet of black and white photo paper, which acts similar to the way film does in an analogue camera.

The result is a simple image of whatever happens to be in front of the camera, with a series of stripes in the sky traced by the movements of the sun. Below is a six week exposure taken at the lake in Beechworth.

How does it work

A securely placed, home made camera projects an inverted image when light passes through a pinhole.	As the Sun moves across the sky it burns a trail into the photo paper inside the can.	As days go by the Sun's trails build up.  Each line represents one full day.
Some trails are dashed as the Sun passes behind the clouds	After enough time has elapsed the camera is opened and the photo paper removed.	The photo is scanned, inverted and enlarged on a computer. The end result is a landscape photo showing the movements of the sun over the weeks and months the can/camera was in place.