PinHole Photography Resource - PinHoleResource.com

Eric Renner and Nancy Spencer ©.

Excerpted from © Eric Renner, Pinhole Photography: From Historic Technique to Digital Application, (Fourth Edition Focal Press, 2008, Chapter 8). 

Presently many artists are using pinhole body caps and zone plate body caps on their Digital Single Lens Reflex cameras. First of all—it’s easy to turn a DSLR into a pinhole or zone plate camera! Just about any removable lens digital camera will accept a body cap. All Nikon models take the same cap (Figure 1); so do all the Canon EOS models. It’s the Photoshop and printing part of digital photography that has a long learning curve. If you have a Digital Single Lens Reflex camera, you should only use a “No Dust” pinhole or zone plate body cap.  These are available from Pinhole Resource on this web site. They are listed under cameras and many varieties of digital NO DUST pinhole and digital zone plate caps are available. “No Dust” means the pinhole or zone plate has been made with a very opaque black area on film; the pinhole or zone plate area is clear on the film. No dust can enter the camera — dust on the sensors can be a problem with digital photography.

Digital No Dust pinhole caps are available for:

Nikon all models

Canon EOS

Digital Zone Plate caps are available for:

Nikon all models

Canon EOS

Leica 

Olympus

Minolta Maxxum 

Figure 1. No Dust Pinhole cap on a Nikon D50. 

 A “No Dust” pinhole is not an open pinhole made with a needle—a place where air and dust could enter your digital camera and end up on the CCD sensors.

If you have dust on the light sensors in your digital camera, it will show up as little dark spots on the final image. The spots will always be in the same place on every image.

After you get a pinhole or zone plate body cap and if you notice dust right away on images, it means it was there before. If you are unsure if the spots are dust, make a picture of a white wall by setting the camera on manual (with its lens back on) and make the image with the lens set way out of focus. Then see if the spots still show up in the image. If they do—it’s dust!

A little piece of dust or dirt right on the pinhole or zone plate will not show up as a little spot in the image. “No Dust” pinhole and zone plate caps should not get wet in the rain.

         When changing lenses or changing to a pinhole or zone plate cap, you should always hold the camera lens area toward the ground so dust doesn’t naturally fall into the camera. It’s very important to not change lenses in a windy or dusty area.

         If you do have dust in your digital camera you should use one of the wet or dry products recommended by the website cleaningdigitalcameras.com. You can try a Giotto Rocket Blower (we use that method) and if that does not remove all the dust, possibly the Eclipse Cleaning Solution will remove the dust. Care is recommended. Don’t use canned air — it has too much force!

         “No Dust” pinhole and zone plate caps are available from Pinhole Resource. They are listed under cameras and many varieties of digital NO DUST pinhole caps and digital zone plate caps are available. 

Setting the digital camera: Making digital pinhole and zone plate images

After putting the pinhole or zone plate cap on your camera, set your camera to Manual. In the menu, adjust for the lighting condition: tungsten, daylight, etc.

Set the ISO at a low rating unless you want pixel artifacts in the final image. Try a pinhole image at about 1 second in bright sun. Try a zone plate image at about 1/20 of a second in bright sun. Zone plates work well too, even when imaging in lower unshadowed light than always in bright sun (Figure 2 - this is a hand held image - the camera was not placed on a tripod) and will still provide a subtle glow at the edge of a contrast break. Due to veiling glare, some zone plate images will lack saturated color as compared to pinhole images. Saturation can be increased in Photoshop.

         Check the viewing screen on the back of the camera and either add or decrease the time. The beauty of digital is that you can see how the image looks and you can always delete. Trial and error is the only method and it’s the best. Unless you have some other specific reason, you should probably always shoot raw files.

Figure 2. Nancy Spencer, Trees, Shenzhen, China, digital zone plate photograph from a Nikon D50, hand held, 2007. From the collection of the photographer.

         Most DSLR cameras like the Nikon series, Canon EOS series, Leica, and Olympus are easy to convert to pinhole or zone plate imaging. If, however, you are using a Minolta Maxxum DSLR with a pinhole or zone plate cap, set your menu to star, go to custom, then set it to Shutter Lock Off.

         Since you can buy DSLR camera bodies without a lens, that makes digital a lot cheaper, particularly if you only want the camera for pinhole or zone plate imaging.

         In 2006, Nancy Spencer and I were invited to China to make images on a photo trek in Qinghai Province, a very rural area that was originally northeastern Tibet. We knew we would be on a little bus accompanied by other artists, probably none of whom did pinhole or zone plate imaging. They would probably be using very high-end digital cameras, which made us realize if we used film holders, 4 x 5 pinhole cameras, changing bags and tripods, that these traditional methods would be cumbersome and time consuming—undoubtedly our set-up time would be unappreciated by the others. So we opted for digital zone plate  and pinhole imaging. Zone plates make an image 7 times faster than pinhole, so we figured this too, would speed things up. It did; we actually blended in with the other photographers and made images (Figures 3, and 4 - these are hand held images - the camera was not placed on a tripod)) as easily as anyone else. A funny story: At an exhibition in Xining we met up with a large group of commercial photographers who watched how Nancy and I were using our digital cameras. They thought we had forgotten to take the bodycaps off—where were our lenses? Humbly, they came over to correct us. When we showed them that we actually could get an image show up on the screen with a body cap on the camera they all were appreciably happy, but puzzled. We showed them the tiny little hole in the body cap—then, they understood and everyone laughed even harder.

Figure 3 Nancy Spencer, Circumambulating Ancient Woman, Qinghai Province, China, digital zone plate photograph from a Nikon D50, hand held, 2006. From the collection of the photographer.

Figure 4 © Eric Renner, Face, Qinghai, China, digital zone plate photograph from a Nikon D50, hand held, 2006. From the collection of the photographer.

         A little history on Pinhole Resource No Dust caps:

Less than a year earlier Nancy had purchased a Nikon D50 in Beijing. From Beijing we went to an exhibition of our photographs in Pingyao, a small city that is a World Heritage Site about an hours plane flight from Beijing. We wanted to put a pinhole onto the body cap of Nancy’s new digital camera. Having no drill or other tools we went out on the street. Luckily we found a bike repairman. We showed him the body cap and using hand language asked him if he had a hand drill that would put a hole through it. He quickly understood, went into the back of his shop, came out with a hand drill and just the right size drill bit. He drilled a 3/8 inch hole through the cap. Next we cut a piece of metal from a soda can, took a push-pin, made a pinhole, sanded it somewhat smooth with a nail file and taped it onto the body cap with black electrical tape that we had brought along. In about 15 minutes we had a working digital pinhole camera. A roll of black electrical tape always comes in handy when traveling. Other advice, when traveling with a pinhole or zone plate digital camera, take lots of extra image cards, extra batteries, a Giotto Rocket Blower and a good camera bag. Later, after we arrived back home we realized that the physical pinhole let some amount of dust into the camera onto the sensors. This is why we designed the No Dust pinhole cap

         Returning to the USA, Nancy Spencer made hand held digital pinhole images (Figure 5 and 6). Black Horse, White Horse was one of those surprise images that appear as an enhanced mishap (see how the smaller black horse magically appears inside the white horse!). The exposure time was about a second. Many of Nancy Spencer’s pinhole and zone plate digital landscape images are in Under the Blue (Flying Monkey Press, 2008) (Figure 7). Under the Blue is available from this website and is listed under Books.

Figure 5 © Nancy Spencer, Black Horse, White Horse, New Mexico, digital pinhole photograph from a Nikon D50, hand held, 2006. From the collection of the photographer.

Figure 6 © Nancy Spencer, Cypresses, North Carolina, digital pinhole photograph from a Nikon D50, hand held, 2006. From the collection of the photographer.

Figure 7 © Nancy Spencer and Flying Monkey Press, Under The Blue, 2008, cover, digital pinhole photograph, hand held.

The above information and images are copyrighted and should not be reproduced without the permission of the authors.