Re: Travel kit for camera obscura experiments

Ed, why don't you create several quick holes in separate sheets of
paper? You could then quickly swap a bunch out until you get to the
optimum aperture. Morrell's book, "A Camera in A Room" mentions that he
uses a pinhole of 3/8" when he tapes a room with black plastic. You
could quickly make 8 holes in 1/8 increments to just to verify that 3/8"
is the best aperture for your hotel rooms. He also mentions that it
needs to be sunny to make any useful pictures. Good luck. I'd love to
see some of your results. -t

Ed Nazarko wrote:
> My "main life" is at the moment overwhelming the part of my life that
> I enjoy - photography and pinholing. (I am 1/3 of the way through
> building a panoramic pinhole camera, and holding for the last two
> months...) I'm trying to think of ways to productively and enjoyably
> use the hour or two that I often get in the evening (or early morning)
> in some strange hotel room in some awful industrial campus area.
>
> Besides black plastic and gaffer tape for blacking out the windows
> (let's see what Homeland Security makes of that...) what else should I
> carry to allow me to experiment a bit with camera obscura work?
> Besides, of course, a camera to record the results, I always have a
> digital SLR and a few lenses everywhere I go.
>
> I have to admit I'm completely unfamiliar with even the most basic
> concepts of giant pinholes or camera obscura. For the average size
> hotel (or suburban motel) room, what in general would be a reasonable
> size aperture? I figure I could make up a few with nice clean sharp
> edges and slip them in the back of my suitcase. Are we talking about
> apertures measured in fractions of inches, or inches?
>
> How about the concept of creating a camera obscura with a pinhole
> sieve? If I make a few sieve images on transparency film, what are
> some rough guesses as to size of the central area, size of the sieve
> holes, and overall size? I love the sharp/glow look of pinhole sieve
> images.
>
> I'm terrified that a few of you will generate some elaborately precise
> equations that will shame me (I do large economic models by day, but
> still struggle with pinhole math, go figure.) Since I have three to
> four evenings and mornings a week in hotel rooms I can afford to
> experiment a bit. A few "try this diameter" messages will help me
> more than formulae - other than my main life, I'm fairly math-phobic.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Ed
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Received on Tue Sep 4 19:07:12 2007