Camera Obscura (Prime •••)
Practice: Weaving
Primary Factor: Duration
Cost: 1 Mana
Suggested Rote Skills: Craft, Expression, Science
Mysteries tend to arise in inconvenient or even dangerous places. This spell enchants a camera, video recorder, or similar device, allowing it to record Supernal energies. This allows a mage to study the recordings made while the spell is active with Active or Focused Mage Sight as though she were present at the site of the recording. The magic fades from the recordings when the spell’s Duration expires, and only one recording (a single photo, a continuous video shot, etc.) per Potency can retain the Supernal information, and only the original image retains the information.
The spell has two drawbacks compared to studying a Mystery in person. First, the spell’s Potency caps the mage’s base dice pool for Revelation or Scrutiny. Second, instead of the observing mage’s Nimbus contaminating the Mystery itself, rolls in excess of the mage’s Gnosis + Arcanum reduce the spell’s Potency by half her Gnosis. If the Potency is reduced to 0, the studied recording becomes useless. This Potency reduction only applies to the specific recording studied; it does not affect others not yet reviewed.
+2 Reach: For 1 Mana, the magic is Lasting for recordings produced by the subject. The camera’s ability to record Supernal information ends with the Duration, but the recordings retain their Supernal information until they’re degraded.