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obscura
the magic mirror of life
The Engineering of Vision from Constructivism to Computer
Selected from the Best Examples of the Different Series od Caves at : Ellora, Ajunta, Cuttack, Salsette, Karli, and Marvellipore.
Drawn on Stone by Mr. T. C. Dibbin, from sketches carefully made on the spot, with the assistance of the camera-lucida, in the years 1838-9, by James Fregusson, Esq.
London: John Weale, MDCCCXLV
Pages measure 21 1/4" x 14 1/2"
"The tar-papered Black Maria was the color of a police paddy wagon, hence its nickname. It was even painted black on the inside. Part of its roof opened on hinges to allow the sun to shine upon the shooting stage. Sunlight was the only light source strong enough to register an image on the slow film emulsion of the day. If the sun happened to be on an inconvenient side of the Black Maria, the building was simply rotated on casters to face in the proper direction."
"Ironically, the earliest surviving paper print submitted to the Library of Congress by Edison was not intended to be shown in the Kinetoscope. This was a five-second snippet entitled the “Edison Kinetoscopic Record of A Sneeze,” or better known as “Fred Ott’s Sneeze.” Ott was an Edison employee who amused his co-workers with outrageous exhibitions of comic sneezing and Heise put the resident clown to work. “Harper’s Weekly” needed a series of picture of someone sneezing, so Heise filmed Ott expectorating in front of The Doghouse and chose the best frames for publication."
"Let's start with a warning: it's important to know what NOT to buy. Don't buy lifestyle books (all rubbish), don't buy monographs on living architects and designers (mostly uncritical vanity publishing), and don't buy books listing the hundred best this or the world's most beautiful that (see below). All that stuff is chaff. Clear it away and you get to some genuinely interesting books, such as: "
"Architect Louis Cordonnier was probably the first to use frames made by the firm Braat when he constructed the Peace Palace in The Hague in 1908. The sale of custom-made frames was a lucrative source of revenue during the manufacturer's 139-year existence. But the firm achieved its strongest market position through the production of steel casements in standard dimensions and the application of anti-rust treatments. The company records of Braat are maintained by the NAi Collection. The numerous photos among the records offer a vivid picture of the workers in the factory, the components it produced, and the buildings they were used for. This is the most complete overview of the series of photos made for Braat by photographer Hans Sibbelee (1915-2003)."
non-standard architectures
World Monuments Fund 2004 top 100 endangered buildings
"The list is compiled every two years from sites nominated by individuals, preservation groups and government agencies. Sites can be relisted, and those reappearing this year include some in Lower Manhattan and ancient palaces at Nimrud and Nineveh in Iraq."