{
  "id": 1703110,
  "title": "Using the railway network as a flatbed scanner",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/18/using-the-railway-network-as-a-flatbed-scanner",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-08-18T11:42:04.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Lobsters",
    "slug": "lobsters",
    "url": "https://philo.gay/linecam/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "The process of capturing an image like the one of the container port above involves pointing a camera out of a moving vehicle and constantly capturing a single vertical line, similar to grayscale lines in a diagram. As the camera moves, the subject it sees changes. Capturing these lines quickly enough and stitching them together can produce a complete-looking image. In the 1990s, digital camera sensor technology hadn't caught up to the size and effective resolution of medium and large format film, leading to the development of digital scanning backs. These backs capture a high-resolution image by moving a single line of pixels across the frame, rather than needing a giant grid of pixels. Despite improvements in image sensors, this approach remains cheaper to build for large formats. The author had been thinking about building their own digital scanning back for a large format camera but found the task daunting. Recently, they watched a video on creating a medium format scanning camera and decided to try moving the entire camera while keeping the subject stationary. They loaded film into their large format camera on top of a mountain in Vermont and used their phone to capture a video while pushing it across the sofa. The resulting image was squished and unintelligible, but by doubling every column in the postprocessing stage, the image looked more like the sofa. However, inconsistencies in speed during the movement made it difficult to achieve a clear image. The author then tried using the MBTA orange line, taping their phone to the seat and holding another phone to the window with a high frame rate. The accelerometer data was unreliable, leading to apparent backward movement of the train. They used a camera designed to read out its image sensor very quickly, but the low light conditions limited shooting to daytime and bright locations. Despite the challenges, the author found success using a camera with a high-speed image sensor and ethernet communication for uploading images.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}