Category Archives: Optics

Solar Eclipse: Craft a Pinhole Camera

Another partial solar eclipse is on the way in the UK: August 12, 2026 solar eclipse – UK guide | BBC Sky at Night Magazine

For the Midlands expect the eclipse to occur from 6:15-8:05 PM, with the largest eclipse around 7:11 pm. But to view this safely, requires eclipse glasses (likely now sold out), or a pinhole camera. Luckily you can build the latter quite easily with some tape, a cereal box and foil.

Some safety first! You should never look directly at the sun!

In fact, this pinhole camera is designed so that you should be facing away from the sun when using it. Once it is crafted, face away from the sun and look through the viewing hole. You’ll then need to move the camera around so that the pinhole you have made lines up with the sun, this will project the image of it onto the screen on the pinhole camera.

Build Instructions

Find a cereal box and cut a slip of white paper the size of the bottom end. Tape this white paper inside the far end of the cereal box as flat as possible. This will act as the ‘screen’ that the ‘image’ of the sun will be projected onto.
Cut two square holes onto the top end of the cereal box (the part that you usually open). You will be looking through one of these and attaching a foil square to the other.
Tape the top of the box back together so that you now have a sturdy box with two holes to work with.
Cut a large enough square of foil to cover one of the square holes. Attach this with tape.
Cover the sides of the box with more foil (the aim is to keep light out from the edges) and tape it on.
Use a needle or fine pen to poke a small hole into the foil square – this is the ‘pinhole’.
It’s now ready to use!

STEM Community Day at Loughborough, 16th March 2019

Science in the Park 2019 – Light Painting

1 Reply

I have added rough times for the images below. They are organised by group(s) for the two separate SD cards that were used. If you do not see your photo in the top, please make sure to scroll through to the bottom for the other SD card.

3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
12-1pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
3-4pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
2-3pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm
1-2pm

Characterisation Methods in Solid State and Materials Science

I’m in the process of writing a textbook for the IOP E-book portfolio that will focus on characterisation techniques, in particular for solid state physics.

This will include:

X-ray and Neutron Techniques
Microscopy Techniques
Spectroscopy Techniques
Magnetic, Electric, and Thermal Characterisation Techniques.

And will, as far as possible make use of open source data to provide real world problems for students to tackle (focusing on data analysis).

I am therefore, actively looking for journal articles that may use one or more of these techniques and where the original datafiles are accessible. If you have work that you think would be relevant then please contact me. Of course all relevant files and journal articles would be referenced.

Double Rainbow

The invisible rod

1 Reply

Challenge: How can you make a quartz rod invisible with some water, sugar and a beaker?

Answer: Snell’s Law

If we take something that is typically transparent (i.e. the quartz rod) you can normally see it quite clearly when placed in a liquid, by the way in which light is bent as it passes through.

This ‘bending’ of light – refraction – can be described by Snell’s law:

$n_{1}sin(\theta_{1})=n_{2}sin(\theta_{2})$

where ‘n’ is the refractive index of the material.

So you might imagine that if we can change the rod, or the liquid itself, so that light entering from behind the beaker does not refract further on entering the quartz rod, we can effectively make the quartz rod invisible. To do this we want to match up the refractive indices ( $n_{1}, n_2$ ).

With water, as you add more and more sugar the refractive index increases, until finally it approaches that of quartz ~1.46.

Kelly Morrison

Professor of Experimental Physics at Loughborough University