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Toys Science

Pinhole Viewer for the Partial Solar Eclipse 34

Posted by timothy from the not-the-naked-eye dept.
Jet City Orange writes: "I made a quickie pinhole solar viewer to observe the recent partial solar eclipse. And then I photographed the whole thing with my digital camera. Homebrew astrophotography right here in West Seattle."
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Pinhole Viewer for the Partial Solar Eclipse More

Pinhole Viewer for the Partial Solar Eclipse

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  • Dude, back in the late 80's when I was in preschool in California, we made these to look at a solar eclipse. I always wanted to know how to do it again. Shame I am on the east coast now
  • Now has someone done the same thing with welding goggles?

  • A slightly more advanced method (Score:4, Informative)

    by PurpleFloyd ( 149812 ) <zeno20@at[ ].com ['tbi' in gap]> on Monday June 10, 2002 @10:45PM (#3677290) Homepage
    While the eclipse is over, this might be something to keep in mind for when the next one rolls around:

    My method for safely observing the eclipse was to use a monocular (you could easily use binoculars as well, just use one half of 'em) to project the image onto a piece of stiff white tagboard. It allows a larger and clearer picture (I was able to actually see what I believe were sunspots, as they didn't change when I moved the image around!). Simply line up the monocular with the sun by making the shadow end-on, with the main lens towards the sun. Then, move the eyepiece close to the tagboard. Find the white dot, then move the monocular out and focus it by trial and error. It took me about a minute to set up, and I got a nice clear image of the sun that would have been about an inch in diameter, assuming it didn't have a big bite taken out of it ;-).

    One saftey note: never look directly at the sun, whether it's through the monocular or with the naked eye. While it seems like you might never do it, I almost did several times, as it seemed so much easier than trying to get the little projected image in focus on the paper. Please, be careful with your eyes. Cyborg-vision is still a long way off.

    • I did that as well, except I strapped my binoculars to the top of my video camera. With the eyepiece of the binoculars pointing the same direction as the lens of the camera, I was able to video the eclipse as it showed on the white paper, where the image was being projected. Worked great!
    • One saftey note: never look directly at the sun...

      A year or so ago we had a partial solar eclipse visible here in Maryland. On a local evening news report they had a story about how the students at one school had all made pinhole viewers so they could safely watch the eclipse.

      They showed video of several dozen students, and a few teachers, looking directly at the sun through their pinholes.

      I checked the next evening's news for a story about several dozen students with spot-burns on their retinas. Guess they got lucky...
  • It seems like it has been 15 or 20 years since I've been able to experience an eclipse. Every single time one comes around it's either storming or cloud covered in the area that I live in (was this time too). Thanks for the pics, though. Maybe next time (2005?) I'll take a road trip and get it out of my system.
    • No doubt.
      Here in Cleveland it was perfectly clear skies ALL DAY LONG. I drove my Jeep up to Lake Erie, found a nice place to view the sunset on the lake, and then about a half hour before sunset: the clouds rolled in and blocked everything.

  • More good Pics.. (Score:3, Informative)

    by umrgregg ( 192838 ) on Monday June 10, 2002 @10:50PM (#3677307) Homepage
    can be found at this site:

    http://images.fbrtech.com/tora/proj/eclipse/

    • Doh!

      Forgot to mention that said pictures on the above are of the monocular method, where indeed a sunspot is visible in one of the photographs.

      Here's the Link [fbrtech.com] again.
  • How's it going over in Admiral? I live in Highpoint, but unfortunately I thought the eclipse started at 16:00, so obviously I didn't see anything as cool as you did. Not to mention that I was way to lazy to punch a hole in some paper :)

  • I used a political campaign sign (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BusterB ( 10791 ) on Monday June 10, 2002 @11:55PM (#3677552)
    I was riding my bike with my fiancee around E. Riverside in Austin, TX, and I stopped when we got to the ACC campus golf course, suddenly remembering the eclipse. I found a Jackie Goodman poster in a ditch, tore it in half and poked it through with a pen. Then I projected onto the other half of the sign; horray, the eclipse had just started. She wasn't as impressed as I was after the first minute or so, so she drug me away. Then, we went to Albertsons (they don't have cheap roses this June..what a bummer) and I had to see how far things had progressed. So, I grabbed a sign advertising flowers ($1.99 each, what a rip!), poked it and projected onto the A-frame in front of the store. She was embarrassed, but I got to see 60% coverage!
  • Basically, it's the same as the one in the submission, but you take 2 paper towel rolls of different diameters--one paper towel and toilet paper roll might work. Then you wrap them both in construction paper. At one end of the smaller one, you tape some wax paper around the opening. At the end of the larger one, you tape some construction paper [or equivalent] around the opening.

    At this point, you should have two rolls, one slightly larger than the other, each with one end covered with different materials.

    Insert the wax paper end of the smaller tube into the open end of the larger tube. Then poke a hole through the end of the larger tube's covered end, using a pin.

    You can look directly at the sun *without* any risks or problems, on a normal day. To focus, just move the smaller tube in and out like telescope. You can use whatever rolls you want, but you will have to have something stiff enough to maintain the shape.

    Just to be sure that we are on the same wave length, the wax paper end should act as a "viewing screen" for what comes through the pin hole.

    Hope this helps.
    • one paper towel and toilet paper roll
      I used just such a device in 1986 and described it on Usenet [google.com] in 1994. By blocking ambient light, the tubes improve contrast so much that you can see clouds near the sun.
      You can look directly at the sun *without* any risks or problems, on a normal day. To focus, just move the smaller tube in and out like telescope.
      Although you point it at the sun, you are using rear projection, not viewing the sun directly. There are no lenses, so there's nothing to focus.
      • There are no lenses, so there's nothing to focus.
        Really?? I could swear that I remember pulling the small one in and out. If there is no focusing, then would this actually enlarge the image?

        Also, I followed the link. You mentioned that the contrast was good, but the resolution isn't as good. I think that the wax paper did the trick with resolution, because it would be a smooth surface. I'd be interested in following up with this.

        On a very unrelated note, I remember that I never got to make this device in school, while my friends got to make them because they were in a different class. Perhaps the public schools would be wise to teach classes slightly different things every other year, with the assumption that siblings are one year apart and that they will share the project results with their siblings. Just a thought off the top of my head.
        • If there is no focusing, then would this actually enlarge the image?
          The image size is proportional to the distance between pinhole and screen.
          I think that the wax paper did the trick with resolution, because it would be a smooth surface.
          Wax paper may look nicer than tracing paper. Diffraction puts physical limits on how sharp a pinhole image can be. I use a #14 welding shade these days. Nothing beats a telescope with a full-aperture solar filter.
  • I put some snapshots up on my personal site. I'm probably a fool for publishing it here but it's about dead anyhow, and besides as far as I can tell, regrettably few people read science.slashdot.

    They aren't images of the projected sun or sun through a glass (darkly?) but of the effect of the crescent sun on dappled shade. There was one really nice image I missed because by the time I got home from work, the peak was well past. It's a fun phenomenon to look for during an eclipse.
    http://golem.best.vwh.net
    • I got rained out. You got the shots I wanted but could not get; my digital camera lay next to me at work all day, just in case I was there late, so I could get pictures as I walked to the car. With the rain, though, I hever had the chance.

      Thank you for the post!
  • I used a handy set of binoculars and a white pad (at the office) and later a piece of white-painted wood (at home). The binocs produced very clear twin images, once I got them aligned properly.

    At 6:15 or so I could clearly see the 75% occlusal.

    Good thing my drive home is south/east so I didn't have to avoid looking out the window on the way home!
  • Guys - this is third grade science stuff, it's so dumb/partonising being shown a site that talks about something as mundane as this. Stop dumbing down /.
    The fact that people think this is cool just says something about the state of the education system in whatever countries they are from that they managed to get this far in life never having heard of pin-hole photography.
  • Fully OT here, but 50 karma is a license to share...

    A guy named Jerry created that pinhole viewer page and made a little joke about 'jerry-rigging' something. Cute. But I've always understood the term to be 'jury-rigged'. So I did a minimal amount of net research. Earliest reference to 'jerry-rigged' I could find was 1919, while the Oxford English Dictionary shows 'jury-rigged' from 1788 (and 'jury-mast' and other uses of 'jury' for a temporary replacement for a damaged part of a ship as far back as 1616.) Jerry-rigged may be a recent variant, playing off the name 'Jerry' (war slang for German), implying substandard German quality. I'll stick with 'jury-rigged'.
  • You can stack two CD-Roms together and put them between your eyes and the sun. If you get the angle just right, you can actually see the sun and the eclipse.
  • Yap, I viewed a sun eclipse with a telescope once.

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