Scanner Cam

The scanner cam is a way of taking low tech images. The scene is scanned rather than taken at one precise moment. You therefore see more movement and texture in the photograph. You see where people have been as well as where they are going to..their ghosts. This made me start to question whether an image has to be a static space, or whether it can be a way to navigate and document an event.

This is what the camera looks like.... It is simply made by taking a flatbed scanner and putting two boxes on top of it, which can slide in and out. In the top box you put a magnifying glass to focus the scanner. You have to play with the apertures to get a clear image.

This is the scanner cam in action.....

and the results.....(portraits)

The first images that I started trying to take were close up. Once I had experimented and got the aperture right I started trying to work on further away. These are a few examples of me playing with the aperture and focus to get the image as clear as possible.

Once I had worked out how to focus on something that is further away I started to experiment with the effects you could get through scanning the image. The first is of me jumping up and down. The background stays exactly the same but you can see a blurry patch in the middle. If you look at the direction of the lines you can see they look like they are curved upwards. This suggests that this is the movement i am making.

This image is a result of me spinning the scanner. So you get a 360 degree viewpoint but the lines show a small snippet of whats happening at each degree. You can see shadows and shapes...it is much more suggestive....

This is an image of me waving. It looks like I have created ripples in the photo, but I am simply moving it through the space when the photo was being scanned. I like the way you can see my hand move through space...you can see the path I have taken.


The next two images are of people walking through the space when the image is being taken... It can be noticed that those objects that remain static look in proportion. However those that are moving through the space look elongated and skinny. This suggests they are moving...(you can also notice in the image below a reflection of my legs on the left..this is because i changed direction and the scanner caught me moving through. Again you can see where i have been and where i am going.)


If you study the image...you notice ghosts of peoples movements.....


This image is slightly out of focus..but I still like the suggestive aspect. Y ou can't quite see our features.
This is perhaps one of my favourite images, it shows my feet moving through the space. You clearly get three defined feet. Again you can see the direction....