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Taking photos with a lens made of ice!

whistlestopgallery.org — Matthew Wheeler took his first picture through an ice lens in response to a challenge by Scientific American and CBC calling on listeners to light a fire with a lens made entirely of ice. Too easy by far - Matthew took it one step farther and started photographing the natural beauty of his surroundings through the ice lenses he made.

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  • MackPrime, on 10/12/2007, -23/+3!!!!!! rad
    • DaMacGamer, on 10/12/2007, -19/+6talk about slow shutter speed! those are the blurriest pictures i have ever seen.
    • Tiabin, on 10/12/2007, -2/+16http://www.duggmirror.com/

      The server responded by DELETING the file? Wow.
    • zweben, on 10/12/2007, -1/+21"talk about slow shutter speed! those are the blurriest pictures i have ever seen."

      Some of them are pretty sharp when you consider that the optics were literally MELTING as he took the photos.
    • EssPii, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1That does seem a bit excessive...
    • skyshock21, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Interesting experiment, with the end result being "this is why we don't make lenses out of ice". I guess this is what it's like to have astigmatism?
    • etruscan, on 10/12/2007, -4/+4Exactly. I can do the same thing with my SLR lens by smearing vaseline over the front of it.

      Some photo experiments = interesting. Others = not so interesting.
    • etruscan, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2Wait... I'm all out of vaseline. wtf
  • Gardenhead, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2Wasn't this on Mythbusters?
    • middleman, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3There challenge was to start a fire, and one attempt at this was to use Ice. They also tried Smokless gunpowder which didnt work, they then switched to using an older type of gunpowder which did work to start a fire. They also tried using the usual wood to wood but that didnt work until they used a power drill. If I had a power drill and needed a fire all I would need is some steel wool and its battery.
    • bluflame, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1They tried to make a lens to fry ants with, or something like that, but the concept is still really interesting.
    • kacymartin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The build team was awful at starting a fire. They gave up on tried and true methods, and started doing stupid things.
  • Frieked, on 10/12/2007, -1/+37I've been taking blurry pictures for years... and with no ice :p
  • bipto, on 10/12/2007, -5/+6Cool. Blurry pictures.

  • NoahK, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7It looks like the pictures my cell phone takes. Anyone want to buy one of those too?
    • shikaga, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7did you drop your cellphone in the bath before putting it in the freezer?
  • BlueSpider66, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Very cool effect with no extra price. I might want to try this out =)
  • adml_shake, on 10/12/2007, -8/+3umm whats so cool about that? Thats pretty much the look of all my pics when I don't use the flash...
  • DigiDT, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Very cool. I totally digg it.
    Though I wish they had pictures of the actual ice lens.

    And the person that made the website needs to take some classes in website design.

    But the images are really cool ;)
    Dugg
    • shikaga, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2It's not that bad. He gives the information we are seeking well enough.
  • lozadaj, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2For the most part the pictures just look like bad blurry pictures. The city night scene did look good .
  • AlexApetrei, on 10/12/2007, -10/+1these artists. They will stop at nothing in order to amaze us.

    OMG look i made a lense out of ice and it's rather poo, ah well s-ok , "if thaty guy took a bag of rubish to the Tate Modern I can make a killing with my ice lense" - he must be saying to himself.

    But the pictures do have some artistic angle to them, they actually have prety good subject matter. I like the last 2 ones, with the floer and leaves.

  • raid517, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Is it just me, or do the images of plants and flowers look like Monet's?

    http://images.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&q=monet&btnG=Google+Search&sa=N&tab=wi
    • PabloIV, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4yup, dude. You beat me to it, but seriously I was surprised to find ANYTHING, worth half a dime on there, but there's actually a couple of really cool pics.
    • Virtualtaco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Yea i was just about to comment on how they look a LOT more like impressionist paintings than just "blurry".

      The tree and the flowers with the stream in the background (they are next to each other mid page) look like paintings before photographs, you cannot get that effect digitally. The randomness of the ice crystals gives it a much more natural pattern than a fine mosaic effect could produce. Very cool. I want a large print of both of those....
    • ConceptJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15Actually, Monet was a rigid realist in his style. He just wore ice spectacles while painting.

    • didymus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@conceptjunkie2

      Funniest thing I read all night.

      Thanks for the laugh.
    • Kitsune818, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I used to have a "Monet was a realist with bad vision" bumper sticker. :)

      The resemblence to impressionists is amazing.. even the coloration of desaturated pastel tones. I'm willing to bet the last few pictures represent the photographers attempts to capitalize on the effect, but you have to admit the truly random blur/scattering certainly shows where digital manipulation has some shortcomings.
  • JangoFett, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8For his next experiment: Ice Contacts!
  • jatenate, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Did anyone else notice that the pictures are copyright 1983.. Before Scientific American or CBC's challenge?
    • mz00m, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I was wondering about that myself... most are copyrighted 2002 though. He probably had been playing w/ ice lenses for years only to have this challenge fall into his lap.
    • darkfoxx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1actually... only the first photograph is labled ©1983... the rest are 2002 or no year specified
    • fatherjack, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3QUOTE: Matthew Wheeler took his first picture through an ice lens in response to a challenge by Scientific American and CBC calling on listeners to light a fire with a lens made entirely of ice.

      amazing he got in the news for the pictures rather than the time travel!!!!
  • ultrasuprgenius, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Awesome shots... but then it just takes a little bit of deception to spoil the whole lot of them. Jatenate's observation above seems right on point. If the lens he built was previous to the CBC Scientific American challenge, then why lie about it?
  • ospreycriminal, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0This looks just like impressionist artwork.
  • mattymayhem, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2They look really good, for what they are i suppose. Wonder why the bloke isnt using Flickr?
    • VeganG, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Why do you think he needs to use Flickr?
  • DanAtkinson, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1It should be noted the effects that these pictures create can easily be replicated without a camera by crossing your eyes or drinking a substantial quantity of alcohol.
  • thomashallock, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1lets see somee pictures of the ics lens... extra points if those pictures made with an ice lens.
  • jczer68, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2interesting photoshop effects.
  • Thundercat1971, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Big whoop. I can see pictures like that any time I want by simply taking out my contact lenses.
  • antiintel, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I just have one question. Why?

    ~A
  • MisterKen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I've achieved the same effect with several martini's and a misguided notion that I am a photographer.

    Dammit, I should have just put them on a website.

    Mmmm...martini's...
  • kida001, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Not very impressed with the effect...its just a blurry photograph. Cool idea though
  • Kazrog, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I like it. I would love to see the lens itself.
  • redsox59, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1What if he took the pictures in a subzero environment?
  • championchap, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0very cool (eugh, unintentional pun), I really love the idea behind it..
    photography isn't my thing by any means, but this is certainly a lot more fun to me than any pristine photograph could ever be!

    fantastic, and definitely dugg!
  • tacnic, on 08/23/2008, -0/+0I agree its really cool
    http://camerawebs.com/
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