Camera Obscura “Camera obscura” literally means dark room and that’s what this was: a dark box with a tiny hole on the side. Light reflecting off something outside the box passes through the tiny hole and hits the back of the box inside. This creates an image of the outside object on the back of the box. The image is upside down but very sharp and in color. This image can also be projected onto paper and then traced to produce an accurate copy of the outside image. The principles of the camera obscura were known as far back as the 4th century BCE but German astronomerJohannes Kepler came up with the name in 1604.