Who needs high quality glass?

To the question "who needs high quality glass?" well... apparently, I do. You see, I bought a little plastic pinhole camera kit from the Houston Museum of Natural Science store several months ago, and I finally took it out on the streets of New Orleans to try it out during my last trip there. The pinhole camera simply snaps to together, which is easy enough. The hardest part is creating the pin hole. This is done by piercing a piece of aluminum foil. What's so hard about that you ask? Just keep reading. The great thing about the camera is that it uses standard 35mm film. The kit is made by 4M Kidz Labs and cost me about $12.00.

The instructions left a lot to be desired. Since I hadn't used a pinhole camera before, I was not clear on how long to hold the shutter open. The only point of reference the instructions gave me is "on a sunny day, an exposure of half a second will expose properly." The problem is I don't know what speed film they were using. I chose to use some 400 ISO film that my sister had in her fridge. I figured a little extra light sensitivity couldn't hurt.

The other tough thing about this particular pinhole camera is that to advance the film, you have to guess how many clicks to twist the knob. The instructions indicate a full rotation for the first few frames. After that, they say to turn the knob a few less clicks for every 6-8 frames. This is because as you wind more film onto the receiving knob, it takes fewer clicks to advance the film an entire frame. Unfortunately, that got me on several frames. There were many that I double exposed part of the frame because I didn't advance it enough.

So, how did the pictures turn out you ask? Well, not that great. Below are two of the best images that I made using the camera. The first picture is of a beer can I found in the grass on the banks of the Mississippi River.



This next picture is of a cat in a window of one of the many shotgun houses in the Garden District.



The exposure seems good, but the blurriness detracts from overall image. Reading the troubleshooting section of the instructions, it indicates that the smaller the hole, the more clear the image. I guess I made the hole too big this time. I will try again and see if I can improve my results. Check back for an update later.