Time and Space in The Portrait Universe...

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 182731

---  "Carol" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:
>
> ...
> 
> Steve wrote:
> >
> > ..., a question was asked regarding whether Phineas spend 
> > all his time hanging around in Hermione's dark 'beaded bag'
> > .... Seems a very dull existance.
> > 
> > But that does bring up another question in my mind, what 
> > is the Portrait's Universe like? 
> > 
> > First, how many portrait Phineas's are there? Is there just
> > one who wanders from portrait to portrait, or is there one 
> > for each portrait, all with identical knowledge and 
> > experience. <snip>
> 
> Carol:
> Given that Phineas and the some of the other headmasters move
> from portrait to portrait and that the canvas is blank when 
> they're not there, I'd say only one.
> 

bboyminn:

Putting aside Phineas for a moment, let's look at 'living'
portraits in general. Let's take a hypothetical person and
say they have their first historic living portrait painted
when they are age 30, say after some big historic discovery.
Next, once they have established a long and lustrious 
career, they have another living portrait painted at age 70.

How can their only be one person for all portraits? 

Perhaps, when they appear in a portrait, it is like an 
enchanted window, and they appear younger or older as is
appropriate because of that enchanted window effect. 

Still, it is somewhat of a dilemma when you have a character
painted when young then when old, plus a casual portrait for
themselves - say engaged in some hobby like hunting, and a
formal portrait for some special occasion where they are
dressed in formal clothes. Again, is it the enchanted window
effect that changes the single character to the appropriate
appearance based on the portrait frame they are appearing 
out of? 

And what about Chocolate Frog Cards, there must be thousands
of Chocolate Frog Dumbledore's out there. Does one Dumbledore
move between all those cards? 

I suspect these are questions were aren't suppose to ask, but
none the less, I find myself curious.
 
> Steve:
> > As Phineas.., perceives..., his personal universe is merely
> > a large room with a window for each portrait he has. When 
> > he looks out one window, he see  the Headmaster's office. 
> > When he looks out the other, he sees out a window into 
> > Harry's bedroom at the Black house. 
> > ...
> > 
> > I speculate that the other portraits at Hogwarts represent 
> > separate rooms in which the individual portrait characters
> > live. <snip>
> 
> > So..., for Phineas to check on his Black House portrait,
> > ..., he just has to walk to the other side of the room.
> > 
> > ...
> 
> Carol responds:
> This is an interesting theory, but I don't think there's only
> one room. In Phineas's case, there's the room he was painted 
> in at Hogwarts and the room he was painted in for his portrait
> at the Black house. So when he steps out of his frame to 
> listen to Harry, he's still at the Black house.

bboyminn:

Right, that was the point I was making, just because he is 
out of the frame, doesn't mean he is out of the 'room' or 
the 'house'. 

But this bring up another point, you say, that if a portrait
was painted in two differnent rooms, those room represent his
personal universe. If he is going from Hogwarts to the Black
House, he has to step out of one room and into another. Those
rooms being the room he was painted in.

So, in a sense a character inhabits a 'room' in a 'house'.
For Phineas, he from his perspective has two adjoining 
'houses' which are joined by two adjoining rooms. To go from
his room at Hogwarts, he must leave that room and enter his
portrait-world room at the Black House. So, he has two portrait
universe rooms in two portrait universe houses. His two rooms
adjoin to connect his two house.

That might work.

However, he could just as easily have one room common to both
houses in the portrait universe. That room being the section 
that adjoins the two houses.

Here's why. What if the portraits were not painted in a real
room in a real home? What if the portraits were painted in a
studio against a room like backdrop? Now what does his portrait
universe room look like? Is it a literal representation of 
the studio he was painted in? Or is it a figurative 
representation of the room that the backdrop and furniture
symbolized?

Couldn't it be that, for a given portrait character, there is
only one /personal/ room that appears differently from the 
outside when viewed from different angles, meaning through
different portrait frames?

> 
> Steve: 
> > But, do you get a sense of time as Portrait characters move
> > around? When the move within the castle, the seem to move 
> in real time. Yet, when the move between locations the times
> seems greater than simply walking across the room. ...
> 
> Carol responds:
> I think they're also moving in real time. They can probably
> transport themselves instantly from a portrait in the 
> headmaster's office to a portrait somewhere else using 
> something like Apparition. ... 
> 

bboyminn:

Still the time seems odd. Certainly the portraits seem to 
move in real time and something like real space when they
move from portrait to portrait as when Sir Cadagon followed
Harry down the hallway. But do they move in real (portrait
world) space? 

Can you move from any given portrait directly to any other 
given portrait in the same location? Or, do you have to start
from the portrait you are in, go to the next closest one, 
then to the closest to that, gradually working your way
through the castle until you come to the portrait you want.

Certainly, as I illustrated earlier, we have seen them move
linearly from one portrait to the next, but is that mandatory,
or is it coincidental to the immediate circumstances?

Are they simply in a room with many doors, and they can
proceed sequentially, or they can jump directly from the
current portrait to any other portrait in one easy step.

Does anyone remember portrait characters moving in a non-
linear fashion?

 
> > bboyminn:
> > 
> > While this was just a lot of speculation, I can't help 
> > wondering exactly what it is like and what is going on 
> > behind those portraits? What are the perceptions of time
>  and space in there? 
> 
> Carol responds:
> I don't know whether portraits, which are not exactly alive
> and can't die, even though they can sleep and think and talk
> and eat painted food and drink painted wine and travel within
> severe restrictions, are aware of time--except that they're 
> aware of being bored when DD is gone because they have nothing
> to do except talk to each other. As for space, it must appear 
> three-dimensional to them within their portraits ... since 
> Phineas can hide inside his portrait and pretend to be gone, 
> he must have some room to move around.) ...

bboyminn:

Well, likely we will never resolve it, but I still find the
whole existence of a portrait universe behind those painting
to be very fascinating, and can't help wonder what life is
like in the portrait world. I suspect mostly very boring.

But, on the other hand, portraits do seem to eat and drink,
and in their own way, seem to raise a degree of hell. I also
can't help wondering since they eat and get drunk, if there
aren't a few late night trysts going on? Which in turn leads 
me to wonder about the possibility of unintended portrait 
babies. It's a very confusing universe.

Just a thought. (Can't stop myself you know.)

Steve/bboyminn