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Pinhole Photography
mm film (e.g. by removing the lens of a 35 mm SRL, taping or gluing a
pinhole plate to a lenscap, and replacing the lens with the modified lenscap).
A cheap 120 twin-lens reflex camera (e.g. a Russian-made Lubitel), an old
120 (non-collectible!) folding camera, a 120 box or a Polaroid camera may
fairly easily be turned into a pinhole camera. Some pinhole photographers
use a large format camera, 4 x 5 in., 5 x 7 in. or 8 x 10 in., and replace the
ordinary lensboard with a lensboard with a pinhole plate. Some make a
lensboard with a pinhole turret, i.e. a disc with a circular configuration of
pinholes in various sizes.
Most pinhole cameras, however, are made from an ordinary box or
container, with a pinhole plate in one end and a simple mechanism for
holding the paper or film in the other. Often the film or paper is just taped to
the inside of the box. Many pinhole photographers start out with an
"oatmeal box camera", a camera made from a cylindrical container in
cardboard or metal.
In my view, best results are achieved with medium or large format film or
with photographic paper in similar sizes or larger. In many areas 120 roll
film is more easily available than sheet film.
(e) A pinhole camera may have a flat or curved film or image plane. If the
film plane is flat, there will be some light fall-off or vignetting at the corners
in a wide-angle or ultra wide-angle pinhole camera. The image may be
overexposed at the center and underexposed at the corners. This vignetting,
however, may be exploited consciously as an esthetic effect. If one wants to
avoid the light fall-off, the film plane should be curved so that the film at
any point is roughly at the same distance from the pinhole. A pinhole
camera may be made from a round ("cookie") container cut in two to form a
semi-circular box. Film or paper is taped to the circular wall of the box.
Many pinhole photographers also make "oatmeal" box cameras with curved
film planes. In my own pinhole photography I use flat film planes.
With flat film planes a pinhole has a usable circular image of approx. 125
degrees. The image diameter is about 3 1/2 times of any focal length. The
image will fade towards the edges because of the increasing focal distance.
With curved film planes a pinhole camera may have a larger circle of
coverage (approximately 160 degrees).
Some photographers experiment with complex film planes. Examples are
found in Knuchel 1991, which is an interesting source for studying the
relationship between image and camera, and also one of the most interesting
http://www.photo.net/photo/pinhole/pinhole (11 of 28)7/3/2005 2:15:39 AM