The 28th of April marked two major events, the first being the official Spring Meetup for the Toronto Film Shooters Meetup which this year was hosted by our good friends at Burlington Camera, under the direction of James McFarlane and the first event being hosted by Burlington Camera which is celebrating their 60th Anniversary this year, for Worldwide Pinhole Day! The event saw only three pinhole cameras in use, two being actual pinholes and three folks (Alex included) used a pinhole adapter. We’d like to thank Burlington Camera for not only planning and hosting the event but allowing us to record, even though the audio from the event was a bust due to Alex’s recording eating the card audio again.
BCi Takeaway Pinhole
Designed and built by James McFarlane, the BCi Take-Away Special proves the point that anything can be a Pinhole Camera. The camera is built around a Chinese Food Takeout container with a cut-down sheet of Ilford MGIV paper and then sealed with black duct tape. A pin is attached with a piece of gaffer tape. When you’re ready to shoot take off the pin, prick it through the centre of the sticker, use the guide on the back. When you’ve done your exposure use the piece of gaffer tape to seal the hole. Then develop it in your darkroom!
Minolta Maxxum 9 – Minolta Maxxum AF 50mm 1:1.7 – Ilford HP5+ @ ASA-200 – Pyrocat-HD (1+1+100) 9:00 @ 20C
Handcraft Pinhole
Next, to the BCi special, John’s hand-made pinhole camera was the only dedicated pinhole at the event. The beautiful cherry wood camera shows how basic your camera needs to be. A simple door style shutter that covers the pinhole, it takes standard 120 film and makes twelve 6×6 exposures. The camera size makes it about a 30mm focal length a beautiful super-wide angle for the format. If you’re interested in getting one you can purchase it through the creator at their eBay Site!
Minolta Maxxum 9 – Minolta Maxxum AF 50mm 1:1.7 – Ilford HP5+ @ ASA-200 – Pyrocat-HD (1+1+100) 9:00 @ 20C
Rising Pinhole
For both James and Alex shooting pinhole is not a natural thing so investing in a pinhole camera didn’t make sense so they decided to purchase a Rising Pinhole to use on their existing cameras. For James he purchased it for his Pentax 67II, giving a pinhole of f/204 and Alex went with the wide version and a pinhole of f/175. For Alex this was his second round with the Rising Pinhole, the first round he didn’t like the results he got, but surprisingly this time he ended up getting several keepers. Rising produces pinhole adapters for nearly every lens mount available and is an inexpensive route for trying out Pinhole photography.
Minolta Maxxum 9 – Minolta Maxxum AF 50mm 1:1.7 – Ilford HP5+ @ ASA-200 – Pyrocat-HD (1+1+100) 9:00 @ 20C
We would also like to thank all those who have written to us as we read out a couple of letters relating back to our November 2018 episode, as a podcast that often batch records episodes it’s difficult to read out our listener’s comments and notes online, but we do appreciate them! And be sure to check out the Lensless Podcast over on Anchor.fm!
Looking for a good spot to get your gear and material fix check out Burlington Camera (Burlington, ON), Downtown Camera (Toronto, ON), Film Plus (Toronto, ON), Belle Arte Camera (Hamilton, ON), Pond’s FotoSource (Guleph, ON), Foto Art Camera (Owen Sound, ON). Out West there’s The Camera Store (Calgary, AB) and Beau Photo Supply (Vancouver, BC). Additionally you can order online at Argentix (Quebec), buyfilm.ca (Ontario), the Film Photography Project or Freestyle Photographic.
Also you can connect with us through email: classiccamerarevivial[at]gmail[dot]com or by Facebook, we’re at Classic Camera Revival or even Twitter @ccamerarevival