Feed Your Head

With all due deference to Grace SLick and the Airplane, pinholes do indeed "...feed your head."

Some will say that the true fun of pinholes comes from making your own camera. My hat is off to some of the artists I have seen and/or known. I mean some of these folks make cameras from skulls and some have made underwater cameras! Yikes. You had better have a lotta air in those tanks.

But, for me, the fun is what's in your head coming out on film. For example, since you are shooting with a moderately wide angle pinhole (these usually range around 24 mm) expression of vision is altered. My cover shot on this month's ShutterBug of the fountain in Oceanside is a perfect example of distorted view and slow shutter speed.

Not only was the fountain water blurred, but the clouds were semi "frosted," as well. I guess that's what they mean by "frosting on the cake." When your film comes back from the processor, you will be quietly amazed. And once you begin to see it in your head at first (what Ansel called previsualization) your images will begin to take on an entirely new, well, point of view.

That is when your pins begin to take a life of their own. It's almost as though you give them life.

My first pinhole was a Holga (see previous blog entry). But, when I saw Zernike Au's teak and brass pinholes, I was hooked. It is still my favorite pinhole. The deluxe version has brass knobs, a bubble level and a shutter release with cable socket. These all come in a, what appears to be, rice paper/cardboard gift box. When you get it in the mail, you almost don't want to use it. But, the lure is too much. You will put it to use!

Load it up and go looking for images.

There are a lot of people out there making "commercial" versions of pinholes and some of them are horrible expensive "custom" cameras that mostly just don't work well. (Write me if you want an opinion.) I bought one such piece that, on the outside was downright gorgeous. But, the $250 box turned out to be a nightmarish camera to use...so much so that I sent it back. No, Virginia, the camera maker never refunded my money...so beware.

Anyway, I put a picture of the Zero up on the top of the page and this is also the picture that appears on the cover and in the body of the article for November 2009 Shutterbug.


Have fun.