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2011 Phys. Educ. 46 332

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A simple spectrophotometer using

common materials and a digital
camera
Eko Widiatmoko, Widayani, Maman Budiman,
Mikrajuddin Abdullah and Khairurrijal1
Department of Physics, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Institut Teknologi
Bandung, Jalan Ganesa 10, Bandung 40132, Indonesia

E-mail: krijal@fi.itb.ac.id

Abstract
A simple spectrophotometer was designed using cardboard, a DVD, a pocket
digital camera, a tripod and a computer. The DVD was used as a diffraction
grating and the camera as a light sensor. The spectrophotometer was
calibrated using a reference light prior to use. The spectrophotometer was
capable of measuring optical wavelengths with a theoretical accuracy as high
as 0.2 nm. Using this spectrophotometer, wavelengths are determined via
image processing.

Introduction intended for direct visual observations, in which

In the present day, spectrophotometry is known
as a well-established method both in physical
and chemical quantities measurements. For
example, spectrophotometry has been used in
determining absorbance, film thickness and
semiconductor band gap [1–3]. Unfortunately,
standard spectrophotometers are expensive and
they have complex instrumentation too. Their
use is also limited to researchers in universities
and research institutions. Those reasons have
led to the design of a simple and low-
cost spectrophotometer, which can be built
and operated by students in classrooms as
well as ordinary people. Several simple
spectrophotometers have been designed using
easily obtained materials such as cardboard
and gratings made from digital versatile discs
(DVDs) [4–6]. In addition, they are mainly
1 Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.
wavelengths can be obtained by looking at a scale
which could be linear or angular.
The ability of a digital camera to record
spectra would be a great advantage in designing
a simple spectroscope. The images could be
saved, manipulated, and displayed on a computer.
This approach has been reported previously in [7],
where the spectrum image was printed and
measured manually. However, with fully digital
methods, wavelength measurement can be more
precise and faint spectral lines can be detected.
In this article, we describe a spectroscope design
intended to be used with a digital camera. The
spectroscope is made of cardboard and a DVD
grating. The spectroscope is mounted on an
adjustable support, also made of cardboard, to
align its position relative to the camera and tripod.
We also demonstrate that the spectroscope can
be calibrated and, in turn, can be used as a
spectrophotometer.

332 PHYSICS EDUCATION 46 (3) 0031-9120/11/030332+08$33.00 © 2011 IOP Publishing Ltd

 A simple spectrophotometer using common materials and a digital camera
45 º
3 cm
slit
20 cm
(a) grating
(b)
Figure 1. (a) Schematic diagram and (b) photograph
of the designed spectroscope with a circular hood to
block stray light.
The spectrophotometer can be used in intro-
ducing the light spectrum and spectrophotometry
in classrooms because the cardboard structures
are light and portable. It means that the simple
and low-cost design spectrophotometer may re-
place ‘real’ spectrophotometers for that purpose.
Another advantage is that the simple spectropho-
tometer is easy to operate and students, therefore,
can conduct experiments without demanding any
assistance.
Spectrophotometer design
The first part of a spectrophotometer system is a
spectroscope box. As illustrated in figure 1(a),
the spectroscope consists of a long cardboard box
with two ends. One end of the long cardboard
box has an entrance slit that allows light to enter
the spectroscope and the other end has a window
covered by a grating. A photograph of the
designed spectroscope is shown in figure 1(b) with
the grating situated at the right side.
The spectroscope box was made from six
separated pieces of cardboard. The first piece
is a long box without lids at its ends. The
second is a 3 cm × 3 cm square piece with a
1.5 cm × 1.5 cm square hole in the middle that
serves as a slit holder. The slit itself was made
from two rectangles of 1 cm × 2 cm cardboard,
May 2011
Figure 2. Grating extraction from a DVD.
which were cut carefully in order to make straight
edges. Then, these two pieces were placed and
glued at the hole to form a 0.5 mm width slit, as
recommended in [8]. This method eliminates the
difficulty of cutting a thin slit directly in cardboard.
On the other side of the long box, the grating was
mounted in a similar way to the slit. A rectangular
cardboard window was made to hold the grating.
The last part is a circular hood to block stray light,
as shown in figure 1(b). The diameter was adjusted
to accommodate the camera lens.
The grating was made from a DVD. Noting
that the recording tracks are circles equally
spaced by 0.74 μm, the grating has about
1350 lines mm−1 [9]. A rectangular piece of
1 cm × 2 cm in size was cut from the DVD as
shown in figure 2. The segment was then sliced
by a knife to separate the bottom layer from the
upper. The remaining reflective coating on the
bottom layer was peeled off using sticky tape [10].
The transparent bottom layer, which is now ready
to use as a transmission grating, was placed on the
end of the box, with the ruled side facing inwards
to avoid damage from accidental touches.
The grating is placed at a specific angle so
that the first-order diffracted rays will come out
roughly perpendicular to the grating. Applying the
grating equation [11]
D(sin θd − sin θi ) = mλ, (1)
where θd is the angle of diffracted rays, θi is the
incident angle to the grating normal (45◦ ), D is
the grating length constant, m = −1, and λ is
set to visible light (400–700 nm), this makes the
first-order diffraction pattern come out at 9.6◦ to
−13.8◦ from the grating normal. The grating is
placed very close to the camera lens so that a small
grating could provide a large angle of view.
PHYSICS EDUCATION 333
E Widiatmoko et al

(a)

Figure 3. Overall spectroscope construction. (b)

To mount the spectroscope to the camera,

a set of support structures is placed to adjust
the box position relative to the camera in three
axes. The structures can be fixed between the
camera and the tripod. The overall construction
is shown in figure 3 and more detailed pictures
are shown in appendix A. All the structures were
made of cardboard. Without support structures,
the spectroscope can also be used for direct visual
observations.
(c)
Figure 4. Spectral images taken with a Fujifilm A100
pocket digital camera with an image size of 5
megapixels: (a) philips TLD10W/54 fluorescent lamp,
(b) cadmium discharge lamp, (c) helium discharge lamp
(images were resized and cropped).

Si
Results and discussion
A
Spectral images
L B
It was found that placing a second slit near the
grating makes images become sharper but more R
difficult to see and to record. Not only does the
image get fainter, but also the viewing position Figure 5. Image construction diagram. For details,
must be more precise. The recorded image see text.
contains only a part of the spectrum. Therefore,
the spectroscope design does not use a second slit.
Typical spectral images with one slit are shown in diffraction pattern is located somewhere in front of
figure 4. the grating.
The length of the spectroscope box affects If the incident angle difference of two
spectrum viewing as follows. During visual incoming monochromatic light rays A and B is
observations with various box lengths, the eye dθ , then the first-order diffracted rays will also
must focus to different distances to see sharp differ by dθ . It is seen in figure 5 that the distance
images. Figure 5 shows image construction for a between the points where those rays strike the
particular wavelength. grating is
In Fraunhofer diffraction, the light rays R dθ
L= . (2)
coming to the slit are parallel, and the diffraction cos θi
pattern is formed far away from the grating. Therefore, the image distance from the
However, in this arrangement the light ray grating can be written as
direction is more like that of a pinhole camera
with finite hole (slit) width. The effect of the L cos θd R cos θd
si = = . (3)
slit width will be discussed later in this text. The dθ cos θi
finite angle of incoming light rays means that the

334 PHYSICS EDUCATION May 2011

 A simple spectrophotometer using common materials and a digital camera
(a)
(b)
(c)
Figure 6. Spectral images with a box length of
(a) 10 cm, (b) 20 cm, (c) 30 cm, with the camera focus
set to infinity (‘fireworks’ mode).
Because θi = 45◦ and cos θd is in the range of
0.97–1, the spectroscope box requires the eye, or
the camera, to focus at a distance that is roughly
1.4 times the box length.
However, most pocket digital camera models
have only an automatic focus system. Some
cameras even cannot focus because of the
darkness. Another option is ‘fireworks’ mode,
which sets the focus to infinity and the exposure
time adjustable.
A longer box makes more distant spectrum
images, which is more comfortable to the eye.
When the camera focus is set to infinity, the longer
box will give sharper images, as demonstrated
in figure 6. But a box longer than 30 cm is
impractical to build and use. However, if the
camera can be focused, a 20 cm box could make
good pictures.
Converting to wavelength
Converting the spectral image into wavelength
information is independent of the imaging method.
Any spectral picture can be converted if the
relation between pixel position and wavelength is
known. To obtain this relation, the observer must
first take a spectrum with known wavelengths and
calibrate the pixel scale into wavelength. If the
position of the grating from the camera is constant,
the spectral image position will also be constant.
Calibration must be done right after assem-
bling the system. The configuration may be
different for each assembly, but must be constant
May 2011
Figure 7. Incandescent lamp spectrum image (above)
and the corresponding pixel intensity curve (below).
for one measurement batch. The light source
used for calibration may be a fluorescent lamp,
which can be found anywhere, or a discharge lamp
(hydrogen, helium, cadmium, mercury, etc), which
are usually found in laboratories.
When observing pixel values, it is found
that spectral line brightness cannot be measured
correctly. A spectrum of an incandescent light
bulb, which is like a blackbody radiation spectrum,
is shown in figure 7. The greyscale pixel value
graph differs greatly from that of a blackbody. It
seems that the camera’s red, green and blue filters
are blocking certain wavelengths. Besides, when
one points the spectroscope to different parts of the
light source, a portion of the spectrum can change
in brightness. This is because of the absence of a
collimator.
The bandwidth of the spectrometer can be
calculated from the graph in figure 7. The edges of
the spectral image represent the bandwidth, which
is in the range of 415–660 nm. This limitation
is certainly set by the camera filter and not by
geometry such as lens diameter and sensor chip
size, because the spectral image only occupies a
small region roughly in the middle of the overall
image. When the camera position is adjusted
slightly, the position of the spectrum changes but
the spectral pattern is the same.
When using larger image sizes, the wave-
length resolution also increases. The value of
wavelength difference per pixel (inverse of the
coefficient of p in the calibration function) in-
creases linearly with image width in pixels. When
compared with image megapixel numbers, this
value was roughly proportional to (megapixels)1/2 .
This relationship is given in figure 8. Here we give
an example of a calibration result. With an image
PHYSICS EDUCATION 335
E Widiatmoko et al

Table 1. Calculated wavelengths from figure 10 and

the related reference wavelength.
Measured Wavelength of mercury
Pixel wavelength (Å) (Å) from [12]
1504 4360.0 4358.335
2045 5465.2 5460.75

size of 10 megapixels and no camera zoom, the

calibration function obtained is
λ = 2.043 p + 1287.6 (Å). (4)
This equation is related with the graph in
figure 9. This corresponds to a resolution limit of
0.2 nm/pixel.
As another example, the spectrum of a
fluorescent tube lamp was taken and is shown in
figure 10, and the wavelengths were calculated
with equation (4). Mercury spectral lines from
NIST data were used as reference. As shown in
table 1, the accuracy is 0.5 nm.
Resolving power and errors
The slit width limits the resolving power. A wider
slit produces a larger angular size of the spectral
lines. For example, when the slit width is 0.15 mm
(measured by a feeler gauge) and the box length
is 20 cm, the angular size of the slit as seen from
the grating is 0.75 mrad. The angular size of the
spectral line images is the same as this value. From
the grating equation in equation (1), this angle
corresponds to 0.55 nm in wavelength difference.
The helium spectrum in figure 9(a ) is magnified
at the brightest peak at 501.5 nm, which is shown
in figure 11. The full width at half maximum
(FWHM) of this peak is 3 pixels. This corresponds
to 0.6 nm, which agrees with the prediction before.

336 PHYSICS EDUCATION May 2011

 A simple spectrophotometer using common materials and a digital camera
Figure 10. Fluorescent lamp spectrum (above) and
pixel intensity graph (below).
The errors in wavelength measurements came
mainly from the error of spectroscope positioning
relative to the camera. When measuring the
same light spectrum multiple times, the accuracy
obtained was 0.5 nm. But when other light sources
are used, the spectroscope assembly may misalign,
which results in errors in the next measurements.
Errors can also come from the grating. If
the grating is not carefully cut from the DVD,
the lines may be tilted. Misalignment during
spectroscope construction can also tilt the grating
and this causes the spectral image to tilt. The
spectra in figure 4 are slightly tilted clockwise.
Furthermore, the curved nature of the tracks in a
DVD makes the spectral lines also curve. These
errors make the spectral line positions uncertain.
However, this uncertainty can be minimized by
taking lines from the same y -coordinate for every
image.
Use of a camera’s optical zoom improves
wavelength resolution, but the spectrum became
harder to record properly. For example, when the
mercury spectrum was zoomed, the middle of the
image was featureless—only a smooth, continuous
spectrum on which our camera could not focus.
Discussion
The spectroscope is easy to use. With a tripod and
camera, it requires only a few minutes to assemble
and to take a single spectrum. The longest part of
the measurement process is the alignment of the
spectroscope with the light source.
Spectral image analysis can be carried out
with or without a special computer program.
Without it, the experimenter should open the
image in any available image viewing program,
May 2011
Figure 11. Magnification of the He spectral line
(above) at 501.5 nm and its FWHM (below).
such as Microsoft Paint, point at the spectral lines
one by one, and write down the pixel positions.
The pixel data are then compared with a reference
to obtain a calibration function that relates a pixel
to a wavelength.
We wrote a program in Visual Basic to partly
automate the calibration and image conversion.
The user opens a calibration image file, points at
the spectral lines, selects known wavelengths, and
presses a button to do the mathematics. Once a
calibration function from pixel to wavelength is
known, other images with unknown wavelengths
can be identified. The program can also analyse
a horizontal line across an image and plot pixel
greyscale values along that line. The flowchart of
the program is shown in appendix B.
For use in the classroom, the spectrophotome-
ter can be used to introduce the light spectrum and
spectrometry to students. The simple and low-
cost design can replace ‘real’ spectrophotometers
for this purpose because the cardboard structures
are light and portable. The advantages of this
spectrophotometer design are as follows. The
spectroscope can and should be connected with a
digital camera. The spectroscope is easy to build,
although it needs some handicraft experience, and
the materials are common. The spectrophotometer
must be calibrated prior to measuring wavelengths.
A known problem in using the spectroscope
is alignment of the light source, because one must
look in a direction that is different from the light
source direction, and some people have difficulty
in finding the right position to see the spectrum.
We asked 25 students to use this spectropho-
tometer and we received positive responses. The
PHYSICS EDUCATION 337
E Widiatmoko et al
students were able to carry out the experiment Appendix B
themselves after being given a short training
session of 15 min. Senior high school students,
who had a little or no knowledge about the calibration obtaining the
spectrophotometer principle, and undergraduate wavelength
open image file open
students, who had the knowledge, agreed that containing known image file
wavelengths
the instrument helps in understanding the concept
of the light spectrum and spectrometry (80%); user selects a user selects a
pixel row pixel row
that it is easy to use (68%); and that they were
willing to do further experiments to increase their display pixel greyscale display pixel greyscale
value graph value graph
understanding (96%).
user selects a user points at a
spectral line pixel of interest
Conclusions
line position pixel
A simple spectrophotometer design using card- (pixel) x-position

board, a DVD, a pocket digital camera, a tripod

repeat for repeat for
and a computer has been discussed and tested. other pixels other pixels
The advantages of the spectrophotometer are
that it is easy to construct and is inexpensive. select known
wavelength
calibration convert pixel position
wavelengths function to wavelength
The theoretical accuracy of the spectrophotometer from reference list

depends on the image size of the digital camera, wavelength

make calibration
for example 0.2 nm for 10 megapixels. The images function
data

taken with the camera need to be calibrated for

end
each measurement batch and then converted into end

wavelength. Spectral line brightness measurement

using the spectrophotometer was unreliable. Figure B.1. Flowcharts for the spectrum reading
program.

Received 10 November 2010, in final form 9 February 2011

Appendix A doi:10.1088/0031-9120/46/3/014

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Eko Widiatmoko received a BSc in
physics with Cum Laude from Institut
Teknologi Bandung (ITB), Indonesia in
2008. At present, he is studying for an
MSc in physics at the same university and
is a physics laboratory instructor at a
private senior high school. He is also an
instructor at a private learning centre on
robotics. His works are mainly about
basic physics and electronics. He is also
interested in cardboard constructions.
Widayani received BSc and MSc degrees
in physics from Institut Teknologi
Bandung in 1984 and 1991, respectively,
and a PhD in polymer science from The
University of Manchester Institute of
Science and Technology (UMIST),
Manchester, UK in 2003. In 1990 she
joined the Faculty of Mathematics and
Natural Sciences, ITB and is currently an
associate professor of polymer physics.
She is involved in research on
natural-fibre polymer composite. In
recent years, she has also been interested
in physics teaching and education.
May 2011
Maman Budiman received a BSc in
physics from Institut Teknologi Bandung
in 1989 and MEng and PhD degrees in
physical electronics from Tokyo Institute
of Technology, Japan in 1995 and 1998,
respectively. He joined the Faculty of
Mathematics and Natural Sciences, ITB
in 1991 and is currently an assistant
professor. He research is in
optoelectronic materials and devices as
well as embedded systems and
instrumentation. He is also interested in
physics teaching and education.
Mikrajuddin Abdullah obtained BSc
and MSc degrees in physics from Institut
Teknologi Bandung in 1992 and 1996,
respectively, and a DEng in chemical
engineering from Hiroshima University,
Japan in 2002. In 1994 he entered the
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural
Sciences, ITB, where he is currently a
professor of physics of nanomaterials.
His research topics include nanomaterials
and nanodevices, as well as electronics
and instrumentation. He is also interested
in physics education.
Khairurrijal received BSc and MSc
degrees in physics from Institut
Teknologi Bandung in 1989 and 1993,
respectively, and a DEng from Hiroshima
University, Japan in 2000. He joined the
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural
Sciences, ITB in 1991 and is currently a
professor of physics of materials and
instrumentation. He is extensively
involved in research on electronic
materials and devices as well as
electronics and instrumentation. He is
also interested in physics education.
PHYSICS EDUCATION 339