Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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I know this is a long shot, but anyone here got one/used one? If so, did you get it direct or from Silverprint?
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Zou's Flickr Page
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Roger_Provins
Made-it Man
Reged: 22/10/2005
Posts: 3069
Loc: Gloucester, UK
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Coincidence that you should mention the Zero I was just this evening reading the article in that other magazine. My other hobby is woodworking so I've been thinking of having a go at making something similar. I'll have to try for a source of laser cut holes 
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Rog
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mike_j
nobbut a beginner
Reged: 23/08/2005
Posts: 1351
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What size hole and what material thickness would you need around the hole? Would brass do, or do you need stainless steel?
I will see if any of my contacts can oblige.
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beejaybee
Marvin
Reged: 18/07/2007
Posts: 4982
Loc: Really Here In Name Only
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Quote:
What size hole and what material thickness would you need around the hole? Would brass do, or do you need stainless steel?
Suit yourself; smaller holes mean longer exposures and more diffraction softening, larger holes simply lead to an overall out-of-focus effect. Probably somewhere around f/180 is reasonable for medium format; relatively bigger hole for smaller formats as more enlargement will be needed.
Material; I fail to see what's wrong with a hole in kitchen foil made by standing it on glass or ceramic and pressing with a sharp needle. Put a layer or two of polythene bag under the foil to get a larger hole. Materials are cheap so persevere until you get a good one the size you want. Drill a 6mm hole in a sheet of thin ply or tinplate and glue the foil "lens" to that. When I were a kiddie we even used to use cereal packet cardboard to fabricate pinhole camera obscuras (with a piece of greaseproof paper to serve as the viewing screen).
A laser cut hole in a high quality metal sheet looks nice but doesn't necessarily yield better optical quality.
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hhmr
Reged: 21/04/2005
Posts: 305
Loc: London
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Quote:
I know this is a long shot, but anyone here got one/used one? If so, did you get it direct or from Silverprint?
Hi,
I bought one (120 size film) last week from the Photographer's Gallery. If you want to see my first efforts look at:
http://www.pbase.com/hhmrogers/inbox
I was surprised how sharp the images turned out to be. The outdoor exposure was 4 seconds with HP5S. Indoors the exposure was 120 seconds and the 'ghosting' effect of people moving around was what I was really after, as change from colour digital pictures using flash on a weekend when bad weather kept us all off the river. Stated apperture is 0.17mm giving f235.
A couple of years ago I tried a pinhole from "pinholesolutions" mounted on a 35mm body cap and here is one example of several:
http://www.pbase.com/hhmrogers/image/55296766
(the raft in the picture has been there for around 20 years with someone living on it in romantic discomfort. Don't ask about 'facilities'.)
I thought that the results were just a bit softer than I really wanted but have been meaning to try finer grain films and extensions to give me a 'pinhole long lens equivalent'. Stated apperture of pinhole is 0.2mm which gives around f225 with the body cap straight on the camera.
I like the ZeroImage wooden box as you can rest it on things to save carrying a tripod around (a lump or two of bluetack might come in handy) , whereas a 35mm body is bit unstable and does need a tripod.
Henry
(Note to mods - there are links back to here on my site)
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Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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Quote:
What size hole and what material thickness would you need around the hole? Would brass do, or do you need stainless steel?
I will see if any of my contacts can oblige.
Try this link for some software which gives you optimum pinhole aperture for given focal length, and much much more.
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Zou's Flickr Page
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mike_j
nobbut a beginner
Reged: 23/08/2005
Posts: 1351
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Hi Henry,
I made a pinhole 'lens' for my Olympus e510 which I fitted on the end of a 25mm extension tube.
I wasn't very impressed and didn't carry on with the experiment but if Roger P wants a laser burned pinhole in a bit of shim steel I'm fairly certain I know someone in our model engineering society who will oblige. I made my pinhole in shim steel (0.05mm thick) with a needlepoint and polished the indentation down so the edges were sharp. I suspect the laser hole sides will be parallel, not tapering to a knife edge. Whether this matters I really don't know.
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hhmr
Reged: 21/04/2005
Posts: 305
Loc: London
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Quote:
.........I wasn't very impressed and didn't carry on with the experiment but if Roger P wants a laser burned pinhole in a bit of shim steel I'm fairly certain I know someone in our model engineering society who will oblige. I made my pinhole in shim steel (0.05mm thick) with a needlepoint and polished the indentation down so the edges were sharp. I suspect the laser hole sides will be parallel, not tapering to a knife edge. Whether this matters I really don't know...........
Mike,
I really liked your self portrait but it is a bit soft, like my experiments with 35mm. I think 120 is the film size to go for, though film or paper large format negs might be even better, though slightly more darkroom work.
Apart from low cost options like oven foil and needles I think the best bet is probably to buy a shim with a pinhole cut in it already. ZeroImage and PinholeSolutions both supply them I think, cut by lazer. I have an idea both are thinned down near the hole, but wouldn't swear to it.
I'm still playing with my 19thC half-plate camera, no results yet I'd care to put up on my site, but the belows and the double darkslides are all light proof.. It's tempting to adapt my 35mm lens cap to fit the lens board for that. I've had rather 'soot and whitewash' results from paper, though I'm still thinking about dilution of developer and even possibly pre-flashing. But perhaps the general fazz of a pin-hole might help. Makes a change from my recently acquired digital toy!
Henry
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Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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I decided against using Pinhole Solutions as they are the subject of a copyright infringement law suit by Zero Image. Usually it's the Chinese ripping off western designs, this time it was the other way.
I just got the issue of B&WP with the pinhole feature (found by chance as I just haven't been to a decent newsagent in ages). Annoyed me as I had finally made up my mind to go for the 69 over the 45, but now I'm being tempted more to the larger format model...
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Zou's Flickr Page
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hhmr
Reged: 21/04/2005
Posts: 305
Loc: London
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........I decided against using Pinhole Solutions as they are the subject of a copyright infringement law suit by Zero Image..........
Zou,
And that's why I decided to get the ZeroImage one despite having had a 'shim on a body cap' from PS in the past. I'm delighted with the ZI workmanship and quite surprised by the much better image quality (after enlargement), though I can't see with an ordinary magnifying glass any great difference in the cleaness of the two pinholes. My provisional conclusion is that with 35mm the frame is a bit too small.
Last weekend I was also trying an old Voigtlander 6x9 folder that I last used in the 1950s. Although it is still light tight the only subjects I found were indoors at maximum apperture. I wasn't convinced that my image from f4.5 at 1/25th second was any 'better' than from f235 at 120 seconds!
I'm looking forward to trying my ZI with the smaller size frames (6cm square and 6x4.5).
Henry
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beejaybee
Marvin
Reged: 18/07/2007
Posts: 4982
Loc: Really Here In Name Only
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Quote:
I decided against using Pinhole Solutions as they are the subject of a copyright infringement law suit by Zero Image.
Can someone please explain to me how a hole can possibly be copyrighted? The principle of using a small hole as an imaging device has been known for at least a thousand years.... and there's no material in a hole to copy!
I hereby claim $10 royalties for every instance of a binary zero or one bit not stored or transmitted in computers anywhere, I've just decided to patent the principle 
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Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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Basically they (Pinhole Solutions) got hold of a Zero, and rather ingeniously copied it but cheaper. The pinhole concept as such would be harder to patent...
Quote:
From Zero's website
Special Announcement: Legal Action against Tim Norgate
Regards Tim Norgate of P X X Sxxxxxxx or Pxxxxxe Fxxxxxx from Birmingham, England. The company address is PO Box 9327, Birmingham, West Midlands, B17 8NY, England. Tel: 0121 434 3321. Email address: ask@pxxxxxsoluxxxxx.com.uk
Web site: http://www.xxxxxxxxx.co.uk
Tim requested to become our dealer in England since 2000. After his purchase of our Zero 2000 and Zero 6x9 cameras for less then one year, we found Tim selling other pinhole cameras which were nearly the same as our Zero 2000 and Zero 6x9 cameras, both in appearance and structure. We have stop doing business with him and we will never doing business with him again. All commercial activities of Tim Norgate and his company have no relation to us. We have already issued alegal letter to him and his company. Further, we reserve all rights to take further legal action against him and his company if they do anything causing damage to us or to our company.
Zero Image Co.
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Zou's Flickr Page
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Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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By the way, Zero sell replacement pinholes for £7.95, including shipping (according to the website anyway).
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Zou's Flickr Page
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Mojo_66
Rain Kat
Reged: 25/05/2006
Posts: 3386
Loc: Lancs
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By the way, Zero sell replacement pinholes for £7.95, including shipping (according to the website anyway).
Reminds me of the old favourite about sending the new lad out for a bubble from a spirit level. 
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/mojo_black/
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hhmr
Reged: 21/04/2005
Posts: 305
Loc: London
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Quote:
Quote:
By the way, Zero sell replacement pinholes for £7.95, including shipping (according to the website anyway).
Reminds me of the old favourite about sending the new lad out for a bubble from a spirit level.
Love it! But it's the precision of what isn't there that makes all the difference. And so we are paying VAT on what isn't there? Pinhole-ism is intriguing, as a cult it even seems quite weird if you think about it too much.
Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day - April 27, 2008 anyone?
Henry
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beejaybee
Marvin
Reged: 18/07/2007
Posts: 4982
Loc: Really Here In Name Only
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Quote:
But it's the precision of what isn't there that makes all the difference.
You can make a nice round hole with a needle if you use a piece of cereal packet as a target ... the precision is meaningless, the only thing you get with a "guaranteed accurate" size is an aperture setting for your light meter - and you are going to be into reciprocity failure anyway, so +/- 50% is going to be as good as you need to be.
I think there's a lot of snobbery about pinholes (laser cut holes in brass shims etc). OK so if you have a nice mahogany-and-brass construction then you probably want the appearance of the shim to match, but extreme roundness of the hole, tight tolerances for size etc. are overkill. What does matter is the point spread function at the film (caused by diffraction), provided the hole is reasonably round the PSF will look the same as though the hole was "perfect".
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hhmr
Reged: 21/04/2005
Posts: 305
Loc: London
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Quote:
Quote:
But it's the precision of what isn't there that makes all the difference.
........You can make a nice round hole with a needle if you use a piece of cereal packet as a target ... the precision is meaningless, the only thing you get with a "guaranteed accurate" size is an aperture setting for your light meter - and you are going to be into reciprocity failure anyway, so +/- 50% is going to be as good as you need to be..............
It's not the size of the hole, but the how thin the metal is around it for image quality. Film manufacturers provide information about reciprocosity failure on the Web and negative films have plenty of latitude so working out exposures isn't too difficult.
I was intrigued the other day to see and read about some images the other day made using pairs of narrow slits rather than holes. It's all a wonderful world for tinkerers!
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beejaybee
Marvin
Reged: 18/07/2007
Posts: 4982
Loc: Really Here In Name Only
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Quote:
It's not the size of the hole, but the how thin the metal is around it for image quality.
Well I can certainly understand that a long tunnel of a hole would cause vignetting. So what's wrong with kitchen foil? It's incredibly thin yet more or less lightproof - certainly enough for the purpose. Or the stuff they sell for over-the-objective solar filters which has an optical density of 5.0 - Baader solar film - which is aluminimum deposited onto mylar film, the active bit is only a few molecules thick.
You could even use a reject piece which has a "natural" pinhole.
In any case if you perforate a sheet of card (supported by a hard kitchen worktop) with a needle you will get a conical hole rather than a cylindrical one. It ought to be good enough.
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beejaybee
Marvin
Reged: 18/07/2007
Posts: 4982
Loc: Really Here In Name Only
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Quote:
I was intrigued the other day to see and read about some images the other day made using pairs of narrow slits rather than holes. It's all a wonderful world for tinkerers!
Sure but the great thing about a pinhole is that the point spread function is nice and easy to calculate - and fairly uniform across the frame - so you can remove the diffraction softness by deconvolution.
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Zou
Pooh-Bah
Reged: 05/02/2007
Posts: 2117
Loc: Edinburgh
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Quote:
you are going to be into reciprocity failure anyway, so +/- 50% is going to be as good as you need to be.
Velvia 100 and Acros 100 require no adjustment for exposures up to two minutes. 
The reason I want a Zero is because homemade pinholes tend to be hit and miss. I won't stop tinkering, but it's nice to have a failsafe to fall back on when you want to be sure you got the image as visualised. There are some amazing sets of Zero images on Flickr, which show the Zero pinholes to be much sharper than anything I can make at home. Case in point, this image I took in Holyrood park:
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Zou's Flickr Page
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