Building a pinhole camera

I can cross building my own pinhole camera off my life list of things to try. (At some point I’ll get my act together and actually formulate the master list.) Having seemingly mastered the art of making a pinhole for my solargraphy adventure, creating something bigger. After a bit of searching, I decided to use Earl Johnson’s How to Build a 4×5″ Pinhole Camera at Without Lenses for my initial construction.

Bits & pieces:
– You may need to improvise the design of the piece that fits up against your film holder if you’ll be using a different back than the one featured in the article.
– The camera Earl builds has a focal length of 75mm. I wanted something more like 100mm, so I made the sides taller. If you want something more wide angle, you can reduce the height of the sides. If you’d like to be precise in your construction, here’s an online calculator to assist you in determining the correct size of your pinhole.
– Earl doesn’t go into the actual creation of the pinhole in any great detail. Here’s an article on Silverbased that covers pinhole creation in depth.
– I like duct tape. I decided to strengthen the overall box with lots and lots of duct tape.
– The shutter is a simple slider that I can move up and down. I’ll need to keep an eye on it to ensure that it remains light tight and replace when necessary.
– There’s a wee bit of light leaking into the camera from between where the camera sits on the back. I’m currently taping the edges with electrical tape (another fine adhesive product). I’d like to find thin felt-like material to act as a muffler.
– I still need to work out a tripod mount. I’ve been placing the camera on the ground, angling the front of the camera upward, but I’d like to get the camera off the ground. I’ll let you know what I work out.

Here’s what the finished camera looks like:

And here’s a photo that I took with the camera earlier today in Buena Vista:

You can view more photos here.

16 September 2010     Photos, Words