Cusworth Doncaster Paper Negative

[Ian-Barber]

Throughout my photography journey, I’ve often been called a "faffer." While there’s some truth to this, I find it’s the very act of experimentation that keeps me deeply engaged in the craft.

Today, I captured this image using my 5x4 camera. Rather than opting for a traditional lens and film, I chose to use a 0.5mm pinhole and expose the image onto some old grade 1 photographic paper.

 

[Nas]

Hey Ian, if you're a faffer then by definition so am I and I really enjoy it
Nice result on the old paper. I've got some pinholes I bought from Mr Walker who designed them for the Harman Titan. The problem I have is knowing where to set the front standard. I've tried measuring based on the equivalent focal length of the pinhole but I got out of focus images. It might have been due to a slight breeze on the day I tested but I'm not sure.

 

[Dave_P]

Ian, are you able to see enough on the ground glass to compose or are you doing it by guesstimation?

 

[Ian-Barber]

Ian, are you able to see enough on the ground glass to compose or are you doing it by guesstimation?

To compose, I set the focal length which in this case was set to the 90mm position. I then removed the lensboard and the ground glass and looked through the camera which acted as a viewing hole.

The results were very very close to what I ended up with on the paper negative

 

[thronobulax]

Throughout my photography journey, I’ve often been called a "faffer." While there’s some truth to this, I find it’s the very act of experimentation that keeps me deeply engaged in the craft.

Today, I captured this image using my 5x4 camera. Rather than opting for a traditional lens and film, I chose to use a 0.5mm pinhole and expose the image onto some old grade 1 photographic paper.

View attachment 5122

View attachment 5123

That has a very 19th Century Romanticist's sensibility. Well done that.

And do continue to faff away. It is in doing the apparently useless that we find the gems of the useful.

 

[Kevin Allan]

To compose, I set the focal length which in this case was set to the 90mm position. I then removed the lensboard and the ground glass and looked through the camera which acted as a viewing hole.

I use a pinhole board on an Intrepid and I've never thought of doing that - I will give it a go. Since I'm currently awaiting delivery of a new ground glass (having dropped and broken it for the second time) that's one less step needed to get the view.

 

[David M]

A good deal of faffing is inevitable with LF. It’s never going to be as easy as an iPhone (other phones with cameras are available).
I have heard of people using a second and much larger pinhole as an aid to composition. The actual size doesn’t matter as long as you can make out the very blurry image on the ground glass. I have lines drawn on the camera and sight along them to estimate the edges, but my pinhole cameras are made by me. Not everyone wants to take a Magic Marker to their pristine Chamonix or Ebony.

 

[Ian-Barber]

A good deal of faffing is inevitable with LF. It’s never going to be as easy as an iPhone (other phones with cameras are available).
I have heard of people using a second and much larger pinhole as an aid to composition. The actual size doesn’t matter as long as you can make out the very blurry image on the ground glass. I have lines drawn on the camera and sight along them to estimate the edges, but my pinhole cameras are made by me. Not everyone wants to take a Magic Marker to their pristine Chamonix or Ebony.

Im always interested in DIY Pinhole cameras, maybe you could share some images of the ones you have made

 

[Pete Spencer]

With my 6x17 So Subtle pinhole camera and homemade 6x9 pinhole, Ensign camera body based, I aim to get the camera level and try to visualize the scene before me, levelness depending on the subject matter. The rest is almost serendipity but the 6x17 at least has some guidelines engraved on the body and a three position rise and fall option. It's still guesswork.

I'd like to know how Kevin Allan composes his shots.

 

[Kevin Allan]

I'd like to know how Kevin Allan composes his shots. Poo

Mostly I use the Viewfinder app on my iphone with a focal length set to match the bellows extension on the Intrepid. Although the pinhole size is apparently optimised for an extension of 140mm I happily set the camera to 75mm or 90mm.

This method cannot simulate the effect of any vertical rise in use and accuracy is more doubtful if the subject is quite close.

 

[Dave_P]

What can trip you up with the various viewfinder apps, for close subjects, is that since they work on angle of view, and the phone itself has minimal physical thickness, you really need to position the LENS of your large format camera in the same position as the phone, rather than setting up the camera with the ground glass or the middle of the camera (or your head/eye) in the same place as the phone. Obviously for distant subjects it make no difference, but for close stuff, particularly with longer lenses or say 10x8" cameras, it can make a huge difference and has caught me out in the past.

As an example, if you use you phone to eyeball a 450mm lens shot on 10x8", find your composition, subject a meter or so away, then set the cameras up with the ground glass where your phone was, then by the time you've focussed the lens is about 2 feet further forward than the phone was, and hence the composition will be drastically different (much narrower view) compared to what you expect based on the viewfinder app.