There should be suppliers catering to the needs of pinhole photographers.
On the website of Monochrom, a german vendor of photographic materials,
archival and presentation supplies, you will find some stuff (sorry,
German language only). But other companies, such as Light Impressions
etc. should carry that, too.
http://www.monochrom.com/Lochblenden.htm?websale7=mono-c&ci=000112
Regards
Martin Taureg
On 07.02.2011 15:07, mark@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
Well I have a drill press and tools so what I was planning to do is
drill the hole directly into the body cap, but don't know if I can find
a bit that small after hearing the discussions. Taking it into the body
cap would give a good clean hole that wouldn't tear up every time you
threw it into a bag like aluminum foil would. Anything paper, ect would
be destroyed the first time you tossed it in the camera bag. I was
hoping for something durable enough that it could bounce around, be
abused by banging into other stuff in a camera bag, and still be totally
functional.
The solid material being plastic I might be able to heat a needle and
melt a hole through it. Drilling would give the cleanest hole and I
suspect that would be key. The thickness of the material also could and
likely would be an issue I didn't think about.
Rather than aluminum foil, if I glued some cloth over a bigger hole,
fiberglassed over it, painted it flat black, anyone see any problems.
Would be thicker than foil, but likely much much stronger. It would also
be a pain to redo if damaged. Oh well
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: making a pinhole
From: Tim Corio <tcorio@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:tcorio@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>>
Date: Mon, February 07, 2011 8:17 am
To: List for Photo/Imaging Educators - Professionals - Students
<photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>>
I played with this a few years ago using my Canon 5D. I cut a large
hole in a body cap and glued a paper towel tube (painted black on the
inside) to that. Glued a cardboard disk to the end with a small
(quarter inch) hole. I painted the whole outside black in several
layers to fill in a few small light leaks.
Over the hole in the end of the tube I taped a piece of aluminum foil.
In that foil I poked a small hole using a pin.
This gave pretty good results. I could not get a clean hole. Small
defects in the hole scattered light reducing contrast.
Body caps are cheap on eBay and the rest of the material is nearly free.
You can experiment a lot for little cost.
Tim
On Sun, 2011-02-06 at 21:43 -0600, David Dyer-Bennet wrote:
> On 2011-02-06 16:20, mark@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<mailto:mark@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > Came up with an idea. Toyed with the idea of trying some pinhole
> > photography but something always seems to get in the way. Came
up with
> > an idea to turn a regular film/digital camera into a pinhole using a
> > body cap. Should work on any 35mm digital ect that would accept that
> > kind of cap, and an extra cap in the bag weighs next to nothing
and no
> > bulk or extra stuff to lug around.
>
> Would you be shocked to learn they're commercially available? I have
> one for my Nikon bodies. I've done a tiny bit with it on digital; I
> should try it on the D700, which should be a bit better than the DX
> cameras; a bit.
>
> > Now I suspect the smaller the hole the better as far as
sharpness, but
> > is there a group of sizes that I should try? How much of a
difference
> > in hole size should I allow. Granted a body cap isn't going to alter
> > the GDP, but its not like getting another piece of cardboard
either. Id
> > be interested to hear thoughts and ideas of those with pinhole
> > experience.
>
> For sharpness, there's an optimal hole size (depends on distance from
> sensor), and either bigger or smaller loses you resolution. For
> 35mm-size cameras, going for sharpness is a mugs game, though; you
don't
> get sharp pinhole photography from that small a neg.
>
> (Lots of easy online resources on hold size.)
>
