# My first homemade pinhole camera



## limr

I found an old wooden box in a junk shop, cut up a can of seltzer for the pinhole plate, took apart an empty film cartridge from a pack of Fujifilm for a film holder, and got some craft felt for light seals. Glued magnets around the edge of the hole I cut in the bottom of the box so I could use a magnet for the shutter.

Here's what it looks like:





But wait! There's more!

I took a couple of test pictures with Harman Direct Positive paper and developed them in the bathroom.

Now, this may not seem like a big deal since most of you have been doing darkroom work for years. This, however, is a first for me. Ever. I've never developed anything by myself. I've wanted to for a long time but for various reasons, never got started.

Until yesterday.

The pictures aren't that great and it's clear that I need to make some adjustments to my camera, my exposures, and possibly my developing (any thoughts or advice would be welcome, of course!), but I am beyond excited that I've finally gotten myself started. I just couldn't believe how wonderful it was to watch that image slowly appear on the paper. I was thrilled that I at least made actual images instead of a totally blank sheet of paper. In a lot of ways, I am more proud of these crappy first attempts than I am of my best shots taken with a 'proper' camera, and certainly of anything at all I've ever taken with a digital.

So here are my first two EVER self-developed pictures. The first one was exposed for one minute and developed in Caffenol for 4 minutes. The second one was exposed for 1 minute 40 seconds and developed in Caffenol for 4 minutes. (The blue marks in the corner and on the left side were from the scanning. The paper was still a tiny bit curled so some of the light reflected off the glossy surface. Will rescan them soon but I was too impatient to blab about them, so I'm posting them as is.)


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## terri

Another one hooked on the dark side.     

Impossible to comment much on the images themselves, since the paper was curled for scanning and I appreciate how much that impacts the result.    You have some experimenting to do, no question.   



> In a lot of ways, I am more proud of these crappy first attempts than I  am of my best shots taken with a 'proper' camera, and certainly of  anything at all I've ever taken with a digital.



Of course!   I completely understand.    I can only assure you that the excitement never really wanes, even as your confidence builds.   When the shock & awe of actually creating something from nothing wears off a little, the real excitement begins as you begin to fine-tune your craft.    And when you're at the level of moving beyond test shots in the back yard, well... you just carry that around in your soul, and then you're an artist as well as photographer.   

Congratulations!


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## limr

Thanks, Terri!

Oh, I'm hooked all right. Once you go pinhole...


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## Derrel

Wow...my only pinhole camera was made out of a Quaker Oats paperboard can...you're totally an Uptown Girl, what with the solid wooden box and the magnetic shutter and the fancy felt light seals and the direct positive paper! :blushing:

Pretty cool project!


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## gsgary

I think it could be time for me to make a 35mm version out of a matchbox


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## limr

Derrel said:


> Wow...my only pinhole camera was made out of a Quaker Oats paperboard can...you're totally an Uptown Girl, what with the solid wooden box and the magnetic shutter and the fancy felt light seals and the direct positive paper! :blushing:
> 
> Pretty cool project!



Yeah, I got me a new-fangled sort of pinhole camera, don't I?  Just you wait until I covert an actual camera into a pinhole! Actually, the coolest one I ever saw was actually a Polaroid Land Camera that had the bellows cut off and replaced with a cigar box wired to the back. It was an instant pinhole camera! That project is definitely beyond my current capabilities 



gsgary said:


> I think it could be time for me to make a 35mm version out of a matchbox



That's another one I'd like to try in the future!


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## webestang64

I think those images have a nice dreamy look. :hail:


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## limr

^^^Thank you!

There were some more efforts after those initial two shots, all which gave me a lot of information about placement of the camera, exposures for this camera and this paper, and the developer. This morning, I put those lessons to the test and took this: 



Yeah, this is going to be fun!


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## timor

This last picture is just impressive. Big kudos to you ! Now I want home made pinhole (have Holga Wide ), but for 4x5 negs and also wide.  Eh...
On the other hand I am glad you finally tasted darkroom (even such a simple one). This is what keep me shooting film (with digital relegated to family duties only, ha.


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## anthonyc12

I get sharper results from my pinhole. You might have too big a hole. With my pinhole camera, an indoor exposure takes hours, unless you use a flash, which means a smaller pinhole. I bought my medium format camera, but have been considering making one for 11x14 film to contact print it. I will have several pinholes of different sizes for the camera.


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## limr

It's possible. I measured the distance from the pinhole to the film and calculated the size of the pinhole from that. It's a short distance and I'm using 4x5 paper (not film) so there's a certain amount of distortion; both these things could also be affecting sharpness.

These are certainly things to think about, though I must confess that perfect sharpness isn't really my top priority at this point.


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## avraam

limr said:


> ^^^Thank you!
> 
> There were some more efforts after those initial two shots, all which gave me a lot of information about placement of the camera, exposures for this camera and this paper, and the developer. This morning, I put those lessons to the test and took this:
> 
> View attachment 54941
> 
> Yeah, this is going to be fun!


this really good one) old-stylish


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## limr

Thanks!


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