Pinhole Photography Resources

Pinhole photography also fits into what might be considered the 'alternative camera' niche, albeit a different niche than the plastic lensed 'toy cameras'. Having developed some interest in toy cameras, I felt compelled to look into pinhole photography as well. If I found the idea of taking pictures with a cheap plastic lens interesting, what could be more interesting than no lens at all? Talk about going back to the origins of the medium!

I have not tried pinhole photography just yet (though I have a camera) but am looking forward to giving it a whirl. If only there were time to experiment with everything I might like to.

First off, here is a very nice article about the history of pinhole photography and then some. A very nice Pinhole FAQ is also available on-line.

Here is a link to "Pinhole Resource Online", a really excellent source of information by well-known pinhole photographer Eric Renner.




It is also the source of the now defunct Pinhole Journal (back issues still available....I just bought a few but haven't yet received them).





Mr. Renner has also authored one of the classic books on pinhole photography entitled "Pinhole Photography: Rediscovering A Historic Technique", which is available from Amazon or from the Pinhole Resource website itself.

There is a website called Pinhole Visions that will keep you up to date on pinhole photography events.

By the way, I have recently discovered that one of the premier pinhole photography groups, f295, was born right here in Pittsburgh and has a yearly symposium that I am going to try to attend. The next one is scheduled for May 29 - June 1, 2008. Their website has a pinhole discussion forum.

So where do you go to get a pinhole camera? If you Google pinhole camera or buy any of the previously mentioned books you will get umpteen plans for how to make one yourself. However, for me, the process of making a camera was not as important as the making of images, so I went and bought one. There are lots of places to purchase them, with film sizes ranging from 35mm all the way up to 8x10 sheet film.

I personally bought mine from Zero Image (I purchased the 6x9 multi format version). Though it was shipped from Hong Kong, it reached me in only about three days....VERY impressive! The camera itself is literally a work of art with very impressive craftsmanship. I am very much looking forward to using it.

By the way, Randy of Holgamods, which I mentioned in my post about Holga resources, also sells pinhole lenscaps to fit Holgas and many digital cameras as well.

There is plenty of time, by the way, to get 'pinhole educated' in time for Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day, which is held each year on the last Sunday in April.

Finally, even though this is a pinhole resource post, I will end it with another Holga image I recently took.

Copyright Howard Grill

First Holga Shots

Since I have been posting about Holga and alternative camera images, I though I should probably post an image or two of my own. I am just learning about the Holga's idiosyncrasies and the aesthetic, so I need to say that I don't think these are particularly accomplished or dynamic Holga images, as they are from my first few rolls of film that I have put through the camera. I present them merely as an example of the type of results that the Holga gives. I hope to have some better examples in the future.

I have to say, I think the camera / film imparts a very 1940's look to the images and that urban type images will benefit from this particular 'retro' type of appearance.

"Cityscape"

"Wiener World"
Images Copyright Howard Grill

With the next post I will delve into some pinhole photography resources and then back to 'regular' photography for awhile.

Holga Resources

I previously mentioned that I would like to have a post or two devoted to resources for Holga and toy cameras, as well as for pinhole photography.

Lets start with Holga and toy cameras.



Despite the fact that it was just published in 2006, Michelle Bates' book "Plastic Cameras Toying With Creativity" has become the bible of toy camera information. If you have any interest in this type of photography at all, don't even waste time thinking about it, simply get this book. Here is a link to Michelle Bates' website that has multiple sources for purchasing the book.

Here is a great interview with Michelle. Here we have another, though I haven't quite had the time to listen to this second one yet.




Here is another book that looks quite interesting. I purchased it, but can't say much about it yet, as I have not yet received it. It looks like it will be quite good and I'm looking forward to reading it. More information about its contents and how to purchase it can be found here.

Freestyle Photographic Supplies also put out a very nice Holga manual available for free download.

In addition, Toycamera.com is a great resource for toy cameras including forums, articles and galleries. The folks that run that website also put out a terrific magazine (and I am not sure there are any others out there) devoted solely to toy and alternative cameras called Light Leaks. I recently subscribed and received my first issue and was really blown away by the quality. If I were to try to make a comparison, I would say it is like the JPG Magazine of toy cameras. Definitely worth a subscription if this type of imaging appeals to you.

OK, so let's say you are interested....where do you go to buy your Holga. There is always e-bay. Another alternative is Freestyle Photographic Supplies who, I believe, may be the actual importers of Holgas into the USA (I think I remember reading that, but can't remember where, so I am not entirely certain it is true).

However, those would be second choices for me. I can, without any hesitation whatsoever, suggest that you should purchase your Holga from Randy at Holgamods.com. Randy can, at an extremely reasonable price, sell you a brand new Holga which has been modified in any number of different ways, including the ability to have two functional apertures, velcro to make sure the back stays on etc....all really useful stuff (see more at his website). More importantly, he provides customer service unlike anything I have seen before. I only purchased two Holgas from him, so it isn't like I am a megacustomer. I had a few questions and e-mailed him and in all instances he responded within minutes. Not only that, on two occasions I e-mailed him questions and he said the answer required some explanation and asked if it would be OK to call....needless to say, after sending him my number, I received a call within minutes providing a detailed answer to my question. You just can't find service like that anywhere else.

Anyway, I hope this is a good starting point for resources about toy cameras for anyone that might be interested. Though they are called 'toy cameras', they have a very appealing aesthetic all their own with many artists choosing to work with them exclusively, so don't be put off by the word 'toy'. There have been entire shows devoted to work done only with these types of cameras. Recently, there has been absolutely wonderful work done by Perry Dilbeck that was shot entirely with a Holga and was published not too long ago in LensWork. That work has recently been released in a book entitled "The Last Harvest: Truck Farmers In The Deep South", seen here, and available on Amazon.com or directly from the photographer:



For my next post, I will talk about some resources for pinhole camera photography.

Hi Tech / Lo Tech

Lately, it has been a bit difficult to get excited about going out to take photos. I think it is a combination of factors. I mostly take nature photographs and this is a time of year that things appear, well, just a bit stagnant.....lots of green.....and the 'good' light tends to be gone fairly early in the morning making a VERY early rise necessary if you need to drive an hour or so to get to where you want to take photographs. I don't mean to insinuate that you can't make great photos this time of year, it is just that at times I get the urge to do something just a bit different in the summer.

In 'poking around' the internet, one of the things that I have found that has really intrigued me is the aesthetic of toy camera and pinhole photography. This is definitely something very different from the attempt at perfectly composed image with critical sharpness and controlled depth of field and exposure that I have aimed for with my 1Ds MkII. The toy camera and pinhole images have a very 'dreamy' and ethereal quality to them that is really something special. Not necessarily better, just different.

When I show examples of such images that I have found on the internet to people (I don't have my own images scanned yet), the response seems to be very interesting. People either 'get it' or they don't. 'Gettting it' doesn't even necessitate liking it, it is just understanding that there is a special aesthetic to the images. I am not implying there is something wrong with not 'getting it', but I do find the clear demarcation between people interesting.

To see what I mean, just go to photo.net and search the site for Holga discussions. It is clear that some folks like the aesthetic, some don't....and some don't get it at all. They just interject into the discussion the question of why, if someone wanted to try medium format, they wouldn't buy a 'real medium format camera' that can be had cheaply on e-bay and learn on a quality camera; they can't understand why someone would want to embrace the softness and the vignetting that are among the marks of images made with these cameras. Really, reading the threads is quite interesting.

In addition to adding a Holga toy camera and a pinhole camera to my kit, I have even bought the basic developing tools for black and white film and have started developing the negatives in my basement; just like I did in high-school. The next step will be to scan some images and see what I come up with in terms of producing prints.

By the way, I would like to thank Billie Mercer and Joe Reifer for their words of encouragement and advice by e-mail. Billie also has her own wonderful Holga image galleries, of which this is one.

Over the next several posts I would like to develop a short list of resources so that anyone interested can get a little background information about the whole toy camera and pinhole camera mystique.

Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix - 2007

I had the opportunity to attend the annual Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix this weekend. For those unfamiliar with the event, it is an outdoor car festival extraordinaire. We are talking acres of historic and rare cars as well as contemporary offerings. In addition, the vintage race cars actually compete on a course that winds through Schenley Park. It really is a fantastic event, even for someone like me, who is not a 'car person'.

It is said that one can learn a lot about their interests and 'style' by looking over their images as a whole. When I look over the shots I took this weekend I recognize that my focus at the show was not the races or even whole cars, but, rather, abstract images composed of the lines and shapes of the cars. I am not at all sure what that says about me, but it seems fairly consistent over the years I have attended this event.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the weekend was watching my two youngest children set up their lemonade stand, as we live only a few blocks from the Grand Prix and there is a good deal of foot traffic leading to the event. Suffice it to say that no one could walk past our house without being urged by the kids to buy lemonade. The funniest part was when I returned to find the seven year old out manning the stand by herself. When I asked her where her older brother was she said sarcastically (while making little quote signs with the second and third fingers of each hand) "He said I should keep selling while he goes on 'TV break' ".

Here are some offerings from this years Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix:

Eyes

Stingray

Front Grill

Hood Painting

Body Abstract
Images Copyright Howard Grill

Capture The Moment

Back in March, I wrote a blog post entitled "The Power Of The Still Frame". In that piece, I talked about the emotional impact of an individual photograph and its ability to freeze time, convey a message, and make a lasting impression. As part of that post, I included four photographs as examples of what I was referring to. Oddly enough, this past weekend I was able to view three out of these four images. Not only that, I was able to view every Pulitzer Prize winning photograph from 1942 (the year of the award's inception) to the present. "How?", you ask. By attending a magnificent exhibit at The Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh, PA entitled "Capture The Moment: The Pulitzer Prize Photographs". The exhibit is a traveling one, so it may well also be coming to a city somewhere near you.

Imagine seeing wall size photographs that take you through history along with information about each and every image. I am not talking about technical information, but, rather, a description of what was going on, a description of the photographers feelings, a description of how the photo came to be......mostly in the photographers own words. I don't believe there could be a better way to understand and connect with each image. And, like it or not, you will connect, and it's not all pleasant. In fact, most of it is unpleasant, to say the least. Remember, these are journaistic images.

Executions, accidents, war......you will be reminded of just how terribly violent a species we can be. You will be brought back to events from your youth and, once rechallenged with these events, think about their meaning again and again. Prepare to have your emotions dragged around. You can't walk through the exhibit without getting tearful several times. It is perhaps futile for me to try to describe the feeling of viewing photo after photo of the events that have shaped our culture, our history and our lives. Multiple reviews in newspapers and on-line will undoubtedly do this better than I possibly could.

Besides the intense experience of viewing the photos and trying to digest it all, there was another message that came through to me from a purely photographic viewpoint.......and by stating it I by no means want to detract from the emotional experience of the exhibit. It is just that everyone attending will understand the emotion, but perhaps not everyone attending will think about this: many of the images are less than technically perfect. Some lack perfect focus, some have suboptimal depth of field, some would have been better presented with longer focal lengths so that the subject would not have to be circled to draw your attention.......but they all captured more than just a mere moment or event; in a fraction of a second they captured the very essence of events that have defined who we were, who we are, and where we seem to be heading.

If you live in Western Pennsylvania, or if the exhibit comes to a city near wherever you might be, you really owe it to yourself to take the time to have a look.

Triptych

Triptych - noun: Fine Arts. A set of three panels or compartments side by side, bearing pictures, carvings, or the like.

I am a fan of the triptych presentation. There seems to be something that just feels "right" with the presentation of three pieces of art that have some degree of association with each other. Three images seem to be just enough to bring out a relationship without overstating a point or overwhelming the observer. Even within single images, the presentation of three objects is most often felt to be more soothing and complementary than two.

I have at least two walls of perfect size in my home to allow the display of a triptych, and it is always fun to try and put together a grouping for these locations (I sometimes rotate them) that work well together. I currently have one grouping of abstract images that I made during an Antelope Canyon workshop and another grouping of waterfall images on display.

I recently posted an image of a tree that I had gone back to photograph after having driven by it on the road. I found that the more I looked at the image, the more I liked it. I liked the serene feel of the foggy day, I liked the pastoral setting and I liked the graphic shape the tree made. As I was 'playing' with it, I started to get the idea that it would make a nice triptych. However, the grouping that I had in mind was different than anything I had done before. My idea was to present the exact same image processed in three different ways. I converted that original image, seen here, to black and white and then toned it with three different tints, all of which I thought worked well individually, as well as grouped together. This type of grouping is a new approach for me, though clearly it has been done before by others.

Here is what I came up with (though, obviously, in the triptych they will be presented horizontally instead of vertically):

"Reaching Out"
Copyright Howard Grill

I think they work together reasonably well together.

Quick Quotes: John Szarkowski

"To quote out of context is the essence of the photographer's craft."

John Szarkowski


I was going to post some photographs today when I ran across this quote from John Szarkowski which I couldn't get out of my mind, so the photos will have to wait. The reason these words struck me was because of the way the thought relates to prior posts I have written entitled "Photography And Truth" and "Photoshop And The Creative Process".

What one doesn't see which lies outside the frame has the potential to change the entire meaning of what it is that we are presented with in the frame. All may not be what it seems.

Incidentally, I read the quote in Szarkowski's book "The Photographer's Eye", which was originally printed in the early 1960's and has just been reprinted. It is now, again, easily available and well worth adding to one's photographic library.

Installing Photoshop CS3 With Windows XP SP1

As most readers of this blog know, I rarely write about technical issues choosing, instead, to focus on the more creative aspects of photography. However, on occasion, I find something that is technical but has proven extremely helpful to me and will take the time to write about it. As you might have guessed, today is one of those days.

I recently purchased the upgrade to Photoshop CS3. Upgrades like this sometimes go smoothly but also have the potential to be painful. Needless to say, there are the issues with plug-ins...will the ones I have be compatible with CS3? There is resetting preferences. There is learning about new features (granted, that is why I am upgrading, but the learning is still time consuming). And then there are the dreaded installation issues.

Well, I went to do the install and was stopped dead in my tracks. I got a response back from the CS3 installer stating that I was running Windows XP with SP1 and that Adobe Photoshop will not install unless one is running SP2 or Vista. Well, with other programs, I had run into the "we don't support the software on XP with SP1 before" but the program always installed and then you were on your own. And it always worked because, to the best of my knowledge, there really shouldn't be anything in SP2 that would keeps most programs from running compared with SP1. But, for whatever reason, Adobe did not go with this route.....they just made Photoshop CS3 uninstallable unless you have SP2.

Anyone else out there with this situation thinking about getting CS3? If there are, you have probably heard the stories about the complications that can occur when trying to upgrade from SP1 to Sp2 'midstream'. I simply won't do it!

Then I ran across this...see comment #10. By making one change in the registry you get the OS to only think it is running SP2 even though it really isn't. I know, fooling with the registry freaks me out as well, but it really was easy to do (back it up first). One quick change and CS3 installed with no problem and seems to run perfectly normally, as do all the other programs I have.

Of course, I have to issue a disclaimer and say that your mileage may vary and I can take no responsibility for your computer. There is hazard, I suppose, with other programs that are on the computer or that might be installed later. And I wouldn't use windows updater at this point either....so there are real and potential downsides. I haven't had the nerve to hack the registry back to indicate it is SP1 now that CS3 has safely installed. But I can say that for me it worked like a charm. So if you wanted CS3 and are running XP with SP1 you can either forget CS3, risk upgrading to SP2, or try this trick.........let me know how it goes!

Also, as an aside, I am not sure if anyone out there has tried to reverse the hack after the install, but if you have please let me know.