camera lucida

[peteb]

Might this be an aid for engraving?http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/neolucida/neolucida-a-portable-camera-lucida-for-the-21st-ce

 

[Marcus Hunt]

Thanks for the heads up Peter. I've just backed this project as it looks like an excellent bit of kit. I'd never heard of Kickstarter before, what a great idea!

 

[Dale Hatfield]

I pledged to buy one if it happens . They take your credit card info and if they meat their quota June 10th then they charge your card. Will make and deliver in Dec. I figured I have spent more on less.

 

[monk]

as a former oil portrait painter, i used such a device. although it was made for me by a friend, it was quite strange to use. beginning to paint portraits, i was looking for some quick & easy results. i found my paintings were far batter when not relying on such a device. it proved to be of value when doing a portrait from a photograph. other than that, i just learned to do it the correct way, the hard way. if i still had the lucida, i'd find little use for it for engraving. jmho

 

[Marcus Hunt]

No, not for engraving I agree but for drawing it could be fun. It's a well know fact that these devices were used by "artists" of the past so I thought it'd be fun to give it a try especially as its very affordable. If it were over a hundred bucks then I'd pass but at just over $70 including international shipping or $40 if you're in the US it has to be worth a punt IMHO. It'll be a very interesting exercise but as for helping engraving? Nah, you're probably right Monk.

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Very cool and a great piece of kit with a certain amount of novelty value. However it's been superseded.

A digital camera (or smart phone) and a piece of tracing paper or Wacom tablet will do the same thing. Probably with less hassle.

Cheers
Andrew

 

[Sam]

Very cool and a great piece of kit with a certain amount of novelty value. However it's been superseded.

A digital camera (or smart phone) and a piece of tracing paper or Wacom tablet will do the same thing. Probably with less hassle.

Cheers
Andrew

I was thinking the same thing Andrew, but with this gadget you can quickly get the outline directly on the canvas or final paper so it might save a step or two.

 

[Sam]

Here are some excellent YouTube videos of David Hockney, the author of SECRET KNOWLEDGE: REDISCOVERING THE LOST TECHNIQUES OF THE OLD MASTERS. He talks about how many of the old masters used optics, including the camera lucida.

[video=youtube;jMRpmqeKg-g]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMRpmqeKg-g[/video]
[video=youtube;hV63JmaaE1A]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hV63JmaaE1A[/video]
[video=youtube;MPvxC7qL1pw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPvxC7qL1pw[/video]

 

[Willem Parel]

Very cool and a great piece of kit with a certain amount of novelty value. However it's been superseded.

A digital camera (or smart phone) and a piece of tracing paper or Wacom tablet will do the same thing. Probably with less hassle.

Cheers
Andrew

I´ve just backed this project, however Andrew is right that there are more modern methods.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-15H8ICC854

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Marcus, in one of my previous treads, "Project Godus" I named Kickstarter. I was asked to engrave 12 Titanium pendants so I too was able then backing that project. :biggrin:

arnaud

 

[Sam]

Marcus, in one of my previous treads, "Project Godus" I named Kickstarter. I was asked to engrave 12 Titanium pendants so I too was able then backing that project. :biggrin:

arnaud

I agree that there are more modern methods, but this NeoLucida is portable and doesn't require a computer, printer, camera phone, etc. It can be used in the field or anywhere else. Also, you can begin the work directly on the canvas as opposed to tracing paper first, then transferring, etc. Of course Andrew is an experience signwriter and probably knows a lot of tricks the rest of us don't know

 

[mrthe]

I think like Andrew, i use the Adobe idea to make the same in my Ipad and work great ,you can work in multiples layers and finally i have a vector image ready to use,but all the way in an interesting gadget ,thank you for share

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Of course Andrew is an experience signwriter and probably knows a lot of tricks the rest of us don't know

As a signwriter we worked in the reverse of engraving. Everything we did was big, bigger or huge. There was always the trusted old grid method but that was clunky and time consuming. Most of what we did was either blown up on an overhead projector or laid out by hand. Pictorial work in particular was generally done with an overhead or back in the dark ages, an epidiascope. Lettering in particular was generally laid out by hand. If it was big then care would be taken particularly with rounded letters. If it was poster size then a few lines laid out and some basic scribble for layout and then it was all done straight off the brush. There were also some very clever pantograph drawing reduction systems but they were never really used as they were clunky.

You are right Sam......the advantage of this system would be the ability to lay it straight out onto the canvas. But putting a lions head on a floor plate could be problematic in getting the lion to sit still long enough for the outline to be layed out


Cheers
Andrew

 

[monk]

some of the signs i've done were laid out with a projector. that was for very large lettering. thankfully, i'm now too darn lazy to tackle such work.