> So, does the light falloff of a pinhole camera image follow an inverse square > rule? Will it always be an issue no matter how big your shoebox, cigar tube > or Quaker Oats box is? Greg, I believe the answer is YES. You can reduce the appearance of fall off by delaing with narrow angle photographs where the image distance to the center of the film is not much less than to the edges. You can also place the film in a curve thus keeping the distance from the pinhole to the film more uniform than if the film is on a flat plane. Of course this introduces what is called "panoramic distortion". The curved film "plane" actually is not a perfect solution because the circular pinhole when looked at from an angle no longer looks like a circular hole but as an oval hole and the apparent area of it from off-axis positions is not the same as on axis. So you lose light there too. One remedy is to make a graduated filter to place in front of the pinhole - this is done with certain real wide angle lens-equipped cameras as well. Like the 6x17 format ones. I believe there were also 35mm camera lenses that had this problem - some solved it with graduated filters but I always thought the more ingenious solution was the whirling propeller in front of lens idea! andy
