Pinhole Camera Print experiment

PINHOLE CAMERA

First Try (30 days)

Adric from QueLab Hackerspace in Albuquerque, tested a photosensitive plate in a pinhole camera, and left it in place for an exposure that lasted 30 days (January 29 blog post).  This is the same photosensitive plate that they sell at Takach Press, and that they use to make etching prints at Remarque Print Workshop.

The pinhole camera

The photosensitive plate 

after it's been washed and "developed,"

after 30 days of exposure

(it may not be pretty, but it worked!)

Second Try (80 days)

DEVELOPING THE PLATE

Continuing with the pinhole camera (after the first "weeks long exposure" test), Adric washed out the second test -- which was exposed for 80 days -- at QueLab hackerspace in Albuquerque on February 16, 2020.

The pinhole from the inside,

and from the outside of "the camera"

Adric disassembling the "camera" 

in the darkroom at QueLab hackerspace

The "exposed" plate

(with a few white streaks, 

which is probably the sun)

Washing the plate with water

Further curing with a UV light

Ultimately we didn't get more than the streaks of the sun passing through the sky, in spite of the longer exposure time -- 80 days.

Washed out "developed" plate image

PRINTING THE PLATE

On February 22, 2020

Jessica Weybright inked the pinhole plate image

at Remarque Print Workshop in Albuquerque

Running inked plate through the press

The plate (left) next to the print

The heavy black outline is an artifact of the printing process:

But note the small streaks inside the protrusion at the top,

which should be the result of the image (the sun)

in the prolonged exposure

MORE

Ethan Moses

Ethan Moses owner of Cameradactyl Cameras, and also of QueLab hackerspace, talks about pinhole cameras with Joe Van Cleave on the YouTube Video -- Joe's Pinhole Cameras - Part One.

Ethan Moses and Joe Van Cleave

talk about pinhole cameras

LUNCHBOX PINHOLE

 STEREOGRAM CAMERA

Adric pushed the pinhole camera idea even further, by using two pinhole cameras to make a stereogram.

The pinhole stereogram

imparts 3D depth to a single image

when viewed properly

Adric used a lunchbox to make the pinhole stereogram.  He divided the inside of the lunchbox below into two parts, so that light from one part could not get into the other.  Then he drilled a pinhole into the middle of each part.  After inserting a photosensitive sheet in each compartment, he would close the lunchbox, expose the sheets with pinhole light, and thus make two adjacent pinhole images (as seen above).

Pinhole lunchbox camera

Inside the stereogram lunchbox pinhole camera;

note the divider inside, separating into two sections,

and the two prints that came out after exposure

When not being used, Adric put magnets over the two pinholes, which adhered to the metal lunchbox.  Pretty genius.

***

There are other pinhole enthuses in the southern part of the state of New Mexico.  Nancy Spencer and Eric Renner of the Pinhole Resource  of Mimbres, work with the Light Art Space in Silver City, having exhibited their pinhole images, and giving workshops there (next workshop, April 18 and 19, 2020).

DEEP END

And to continue diving off the deep end, the previous blog posting linked to a more detailed post about anamorphosis, stereograms, lithophanes, and other kinds of distortions I could put my drawings through using online computer software and...