158-lens camera

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By Sean Michael Ragan
Posted 2009/12/16 @ 6:44 am
Category Art & Design, General, Photography & Video, Science

Built by Associate Professor Yojiro Ishino of the Nagoya Institute of Technology, this giant camera took six months to build and has reportedly been certified by the Guinness Book of World Records as the camera with the record-holding highest number of lenses. It’s about 3 inches high and 18.5 inches across, and was built to study flames by capturing them simultaneously from ~~as many angles as possible~~ a large number of angles. [via Neatorama]

BY Sean Michael Ragan

I am descended from 5,000 generations of tool-using primates. Also, I went to college and stuff. I write for MAKE, serve as Technical Editor for MAKE magazine, and develop original DIY content for Make: Projects.

In the Maker Shed

7 Responses to 158-lens camera

John on December 16th, 2009 at 6:57 am said:

As many angles as possible? Then why is it a short small arc? As many as possible should be a sphere around the flame. Presumably as built is good enough for the job, so I just wonder if it’s the writer being overly dramatic and coming off stupid again.

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Aron on December 16th, 2009 at 8:15 am said:

I guess the “Guiness Book of World Records” was un-aware of Dayton Taylor’s “Timetrack” Cameras (design and built by a friend’s of mine) that have up to 160 lenses (or more – many configurations are available)â€¦ see:
http://www.timetrack.com/timetrackcameras.html

This camera system is the one used in films like the Matrix… and most every commercial with “that effect”…

It is the real “Shizzle”

AB

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Shadyman on December 16th, 2009 at 8:21 am said:

@Aron:

I’ve heard of the TimeTrack… I saw it on Discovery Canada’s “Daily Planet” show

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Volkemon on December 16th, 2009 at 9:08 am said:

@John- Geez…
” writer being overly dramatic and coming off stupid again”

Sean was using the text as it appeared in the crunchgear post, source for the neatorama post.

@Aron- thanks for the link! That is pretty neat.
My impression (right or wrong…) is that the timetrack takes a BUNCH of pictures at once, more like 160 cameras working together than one 160 lens camera. This one takes one 3D pic,using all the lenses. Maybe that is the difference to the Guiness people?

(Not enough time during lunch to research this

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- John on December 16th, 2009 at 10:15 am said:
  
  I had no intention of insulting Sean, by writer I meant the person who wrote the quote originally in the crunchgear post or wherever crunchgear got it from. I wouldn’t be too hard on on the make blog poster for quoting something stupidly written by someone else.
  
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Aron on December 16th, 2009 at 10:50 am said:

All,

Here is a “How it Works” video:
http://www.virtualcamera.com/doc.html

AB

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Volkemon on December 16th, 2009 at 11:10 am said:

@Aron- THANKS!!!!

And in the video, it does state that the Timetrak takes many pictures at once. So maybe the folks at Guiness consider it a large array of linked cameras.

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