Possibly, but no one has proved that Johannes Vermeer used a camera obscura. The evidence lies in the look of his paintings, not in any document.
A camera obscura is a darkened box or room where a lens projects a live image of the scene outside onto a wall. Some scholars believe the Dutch painter worked with one, others doubt it, and the argument has run for more than a century.
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Vermeer worked in the Dutch city of Delft in the seventeenth century, and his pictures often look as if a lens had been in the room. Highlights turn into soft glowing dots of light, and the depth feels almost photographic.
Yet he left no notebook, no letter and no instrument, and no inventory or witness from his century mentions a lens. I find the optical clues real and the proof missing.
The etcher who raised the question
The question was first put in print in 1891 by Joseph Pennell, an American etcher, that is, an artist who makes prints from metal plates bitten with acid…
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