triptych #26 (pinhole) / pinhole # 11-12 ~ more tiny little hole pictures

rusting hulk ~ near Keeseville, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggen
yellow leaves ~ former AFB / Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen
Pride of the Adirondacks ~ former AFB / Plattsburgh, NY • click to embiggen

As mentioned in yesterday's post, I have been making some pictures with what amounts to a pinhole lens cap mounted on a µ4/3 camera. The intended use is for submission to a juried pinhole exhibit "competition".

While I have dabbled from time to time with making pinhole pictures - usually with a 4×5 view camera and polaroid film - I have never really become fully involved with the genre. Over the years I have come across bodies of pinhole work and individual pictures which have captured my favorable attention. But, to be honest, I can't really articulate why those pictures appealed to me (or any pinhole pictures) other than to write that I like the way they look.

There is not much writing on pinhole picture making other a plethora of how-to-make a pinhole camera articles. It would seem that there aren't any photo critics who have taken up the subject in order to help define the aesthetics/ vernacular of the genre. In my search for such writing I did find this from pinhole picture maker Dave Clarridge:

What I love about pinhole photography is that it is MAGICAL. Without all the expensive gadgetry I am able to capture what I feel, more than what I see. One never knows exactly what you’re going to get with a pinhole camera until the film is developed. And what appears is something only a pinhole camera can see. It’s as though a parallel universe is opened up to us.

All of that written, what I am pursuing with my pinhole picture making, at least at this stage of involvement, is to make picture which, if nothing else, I find to be visually pleasing. Without a doubt, a primary element of "visually pleasing" in pinhole pictures is the ethereal / insubstantial nature of the pictures. A characteristic which might be likened to the appearance of a ghost or a dream.

That visual characteristic is the result of making an impression of the real as opposed to a true and accurate representation of the real. Some might label it a "poetic" impression, others might label it as simply an easy and cheap picture making effect.

In any event, at this point I am not weighing in on that subject. I'm just making pictures and seeing what happens.

Any thoughts, options or comments?

FYI, the effective aperture of my pinhole is somewhere in the neighborhood of f96-f128 which dictates an ISO of 1600 and a shutter speed of 1/2-1/4s, even in relatively bright sunlight. A tripod is nearly mandatory, although, kudos to the Oly OM-D EM-1 for its 5 axis IS which makes handholding at 1/4s a real possibility.