Promised pic from the Daylesford Pinhole workshop. We built the cardboard camera then went out and shot on an RC paper neg.
edit: details now pasted in from my blog -sorry, I was in a hurry when I posted the pic last night..
__
I've sung the praises of the Browell pinhole workshop, and I'm sure he wouldn't mind my divulging a few of the 'secrets' from the day.
Actually there were no secrets, just Anthony trumpeting loud and clear just what fun pinhole photography can be.
The first part of the day was taken up with camera manufacture. The first principle of pinhole being that since we are dealing with a low tech tool, why degrade the image unnecessarily through enlargement. The smallest camera he uses is 10x8, using either a paper or film neg. If you stick to paper, larger sizes are hardly a problem either.
Our cardboard cameras came together quickly. We used a 10x8 film box and it's lid as the camera standards (front and back panel) and filled in the sides of the camera with hastily cut cardboard, all gaffed together. The pinhole was simply that- poked with a pin through kitchen aluminum foil, and the film holder at the back consists of two doubled over bits of gaffa- the film or paper simply sticks to the back of the camera.
Once the camera was been loaded in the darkroom the body taped shut and a gaffa tape shutter dabbed over the pinhole, we were ready to shoot.
Dealing with such long exposures means there is much opportunity for movement, so Browell suggests using that movement blur to make the image stand apart from common ol' lensed pictures. In his own portraits, he frequently adds a loosely fixed sheet as a background that will flap in the breeze and create this movement factor. The pinhole also offers incredible wide angle and depth of field possibilities, so we structured compositions around those elements.
Daylesford was blowing a freezing gale that day so the actual picture taking time was reduced to a quick dash into the garden to snap whatever was at hand, before retreating to the snug workshop. To avoid camera movement in the wind, I lay the camera at the foot of a tree, weighted it with a rock, and photographed the branches overhead. The smudges are subject movement during the 1 minute exposure. 'Film' was a sheet of 10x8 Ilford RC paper. (approx IS0=5)
The paper neg was processed in ID-11 mixed to around 1:1 or 1:2, to give much more aggressive development than the 1:9 dilutions paper normally calls for. The paper neg was then contact printed and processed in normal dev dilution to make this image.
The only drawback of this approach is the one-shot nature of the camera. Browell's own hand-made timber and brass camera fits 10x8 darkslides which accommodate either film or paper to allow for a day's shooting without needing a car full of camera bodies.
[attachment deleted by admin]
