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Taking a Photo Inside a black Hole The following is a “thought Experiment” which could describe an actual methodology to photograph (and be able to see the photograph) of the area inside a Black Hole’s event horizon. The thought experiment is based on the fact that one force can have an effect which transgresses the event horizon (I believe) and that is gravity. The process to take a photo would be as follows:

  1. A camera would be prepared and put onto a trajectory to enter a Supermassive Black Hole (SMBH). This type black hole would be used to minimize the tidal forces encountered.

  2. The Black hole selected should be one with some other massive body nearby that swings close to the black hole on an elliptical orbit. The lower tidal forces at the event horizon of a SMBH allows us to postulate a large planet or sun orbiting the SMBH without being torn to dust.

  3. Now we are set for the experiment:

    a. The camera enters the event horizon of the Black Hole (BHC) and snaps a photo of the inside of the SMBH. It’s entry is timed to be just before the close passage of the other massive body.

    b. As the other body passes close to the SMBH with the camera inside it, it would create a “dent” in the event horizon of the SMBH, and the physical location of the camera is now outside the deformed Even Horizon.

    c. The camera quickly beams out electronically the photo taken while it was inside the event horizon, thus showing what the inside of a Black Hole looks like. Another way of looking at it is that the camera is using the orbiting massive body as a “booster rocket” for the electronic beam from it’s camera, adding it’s gravitational pull to “boost” the signal out of the SMBH. Obviously, there are all sorts of technical, engineering issues to be faced with this experiment, but it seems to be consistent with the physical laws regarding a Black Hole.

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    $\begingroup$ You are assuming that a deformation of the event horizon can expose objects that were inside the event horizon. This is incorrect. $\endgroup$
    – user178659
    Jun 16, 2021 at 19:08
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    $\begingroup$ I am not trying to be snarky. But without reading anything more than the title, the answer has to be no. Nothing inside a black hole can get out. (Caveat - you could wait for the black hole to evaporate). Light inside a black hold heads toward the center, not away. So it would be hard to take a photo anyway. $\endgroup$
    – mmesser314
    Jun 16, 2021 at 20:28
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    $\begingroup$ Why do you think the orbiting body would create a dent, rather than an "anti-dent"? Please see this related question: physics.stackexchange.com/q/39253/123208 $\endgroup$
    – PM 2Ring
    Jun 16, 2021 at 20:45
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    $\begingroup$ Even if you could get the picture, what reason is there to think that the view from just inside the event horizon of a super massive black hole would be any different from the view from just outside the event horizon? $\endgroup$
    – Solomon Slow
    Jun 16, 2021 at 21:05

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There would be no dent. The orbiting body would in fact draw the event horizon out towards itself in a bulge - otherwise it would never be able to reach the event horizon and fall in.

But what if your camera was loosed into that passing bulge? As the bulge moves on, could it leave the camera high and dry? Sadly, no. The event horizon forms what is known as a trapped surface. As it subsided back again the camera would fall lower too and stay trapped inside.

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Step 3a fails. An observer a constant distance from the black hole will have to wait an infinite amount of time to see an object fall past the horizon. Putting it another way, say the camera is snapping pictures and beaming them out via radio waves every second. Then an observer outside the black hole, will only ever receive pictures taken outside the event horizon, and they will have to wait progressively longer for each successive picture, and the frequency of the transmission will be lower and lower.

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