Whilst some of the world are celebrating something to do with Jesus and his amazing egg-laden bunnies; there’s a hard-core of crazies who recognise today as Worldwide Pinhole Photography day.
A pinhole photograph is created by using a tiny hole to allow light onto the film or sensor. There is no lens, just the hole. The principle was discovered by the Chinese (who else?) about 500 years before Jesus and his bunnies appeared; and pinhole cameras have been around for more than a hundred years.
Nowadays, if you want to take pinhole photographs, you make your own camera. Pringles cans are popular as the basis, or you can just poke a hole on an old lens cap and stick it on your regular camera. Or, if you have a Micro Four Thirds camera, you can now buy a custom designed pinhole, called a Pinwide, from Wanderlust Cameras.
Why pay $40 when you can make one yourself? Well, the hole on the Pinwide has been etched to an exact size to give the best possible image; and the Pinwide hole is recessed deep into the camera so you obtain a very wide field of view and gather the maximum light. Plus it comes in a very attractive tin box, and you can never have too many attractive tin boxes.
The first thing you notice is how tiny the hole is. On a normal lens, F/16 is probably about as small as you would go:
But that’s the light of ten thousand suns compared to the teeny tiny hole in the Pinwide:
The actual hole is the tiny black dot inside the grey area inside the white area. It’s small!
The manufacturers rate it as something between F/96 and F/128, depending on which part of the sensor you read from. Whatever the number, you are going to need a tripod or very steady hands and a high ISO, but on the plus side you are going to produce images where everything is in focus due to the resulting infinite depth of field.
However, don’t get excited about the “in focus” bit. Without a lens, the resulting images will be very soft, almost dreamlike, in quality; which of course is part of the attraction.
Shooting with the Pinwide is very easy. Stick the camera on manual, adjust the shutter speed to match the exposure, and shoot. No focusing required.
The results are technically poor compared to using a proper lens; but that’s not the point. With the soft focus, slightly distorted colours, heavy vignetting and a photo where everything is as sharp as everything else; it is not difficult to produce something that looks different and maybe even looks interesting (if only to you). Personally I like the look a lot and have spent the last couple of afternoons with the Pinwide and a tripod. I think the results are fun, your mileage may vary.
Micro Four Thirds rocks. Thirty year old Russian lenses, cinema and TV lenses, state of the art Voigtlander lenses; there is such a wide range of offerings. And now you can slap on a tiny hole and go create your own weird bits of art. How’s that for a happy Easter?
Comments 🔗
2011-04-24| Barry saysThis is actually interesting, and jolly good snaps, what!