Camera Lucida
Camera Lucida
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Usage conditions apply
- Description
- The U.S. Military Academy acquired this fairly large camera lucida in 1830. One inscription reads "Vincent et C. Chevalier / Quai de l'horloge N 69, à Paris." Another reads “C. CHEVALIER / 829.” Vincent Chevalier, a noted optical instrument maker in Paris, based the form on the design introduced in 1819 by Giovanni Battista Amici (1786-1863), professor of mathematics at the University of Modena. It has a heavy glass prism and two external optical elements: one has a clear lens and a blue glass filter; the other has two blue filters.
- Ref: John Hammond and Jill Austin, The Camera Lucida in Art and Science (1987), pp. 37-41.
- Vincent Chevalier, Notice sur l’usage de la Chambre Claire (Camera Lucida) (Paris, 1834).
- J. G. A. Chevallier, Le Conservateur de la Vue (Paris, 1815), pp. 305-309.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Object Name
- Camera Lucida
- place made
- France: Île-de-France, Paris
- Physical Description
- brass (overall material)
- Measurements
- overall: 10 19/32 in x 3 3/4 in x 1 3/4 in; 26.924 cm x 9.525 cm x 4.445 cm
- overall: 1 3/4 in x 10 1/2 in x 3 7/8 in; 4.445 cm x 26.67 cm x 9.8425 cm
- ID Number
- PH.315419
- catalog number
- 315419
- accession number
- 217544
- subject
- Science & Scientific Instruments
- See more items in
- Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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