Experimental Photography Peugeot Pinhole Camera plan

So for my main idea for the experimental photography brief I am going to attempt to turn my Peugeot 206 in to a large format pinhole camera.

To warrant having used my car when any pinhole camera would have been fine, I am going to use large paper stock of 20X24 inches or slightly smaller 20X16 in paper..

After using a pinhole calculator I got the following results.

I estimated my focal length at 700mm, but the calculator shows that the optimal focal length would be 562mm with a pinhole diameter of 1.12 mm. This is where my paper would need to be for the sharpest image. My aperture would be f/501.

The estimated exposure time will be different as it is unlikely I will be shooting on a 'sunny' day and the exposure time doesn't account for reciprocity failure, so I will have to test this myself.

Using the data given by the calculator, I have created a basic CAD diagram of the set up.

I will be taking my photographs in landscape orientation as the height of the car interior does not allow for portrait orientation.
Therefore the 'height' of the paper is roughly 510mm (about 20 inches), and the 'width' is roughly 610mm (about 24 inches). The angle of view was calculated at 59.5 degrees. The height of the paper will capture 48.8 degrees, and the width of the paper will capture 57.2 degrees.
The floor will not be visible until roughly 2.6 meters away from the car.
The outer circle represents the diagonal diameter of the paper, the inner circle represents the image diameter at the focal plane.

I have drawn a diagram of how the light will fall on the paper:

The blue circle is the diameter of the paper (795mm) the yellow circle is the image diameter (625mm) at the optimal focal length (562mm). The white rectangle is the 20x24 paper, and the dark grey area is where light will hit the paper. The resulting photo could look something like this:

sample image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/balboulloude/10269743934/in/faves-98664986@N03/

I am going to use black out fabric to block out the light, this will be attached to the outside of the car using strong magnets, once all the windows are covered I will climb in, I will have an assistant to finish off the magnets after the door is closed, and the cover the whole car with car cover. This will cover any parts I may have missed and also keep all the black out fabric secure.

I had to step down and use 20X16 in paper and college don't have developing trays large enough, and so the image circle now fully covers the paper.



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Still life final compositions

Using the same lighting set up but changing the composition and angle I think I have created a much more interesting photograph, I have done two slightly different compositions for comparison:

 

Overall I prefer the red image, I think it has a greater sense of wealth about it compared to the simplicity of the first set up. I submitted this image to a photocritique group where it got some good feedback, to see this thread click here.

I shot in RAW + Large JPEG using a custom white balance and used my raw images when editing. I used the set up described in this post for my lighting. The only issues I had was the reflection in the glass and the red colour of the fabric. The glass issue was rectified by placing a further diffuser in front of the light source so soften the light so that the reflection didn't look like a soft box. In Photoshop the oil paint filter made the reflection softer yet and so less noticeable. The red fabric was corrected in RAW processing as my custom white balance suited the everything but the fabric. This allowed me to do my own colour corrections as JPEG files are already manipulated by the camera.

In this image I feel I have included both props and a set. The props are the grapes, the rope, the bottle and sand, the skull and jaw bones, the red 'cloak' and the fleece. The set is the wooden floor/table and the mottled backdrop to emulate the textured walls used in the Dutch Vanitas I was using for inspiration. The bottom of the 'table' cannot be seen, but it should be assumed that is a permanent fixture and looks something like THIS from beneath.

In this example of a Vanitas everything on the table is a prop, the table and wall are the set.


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Props and sets.

What is a prop and what constitutes a set?

To fulfill this brief it is important to include props and sets in the photographs you create. In order to do this you must first know what a prop and a set are.


In film and photography a 'prop' is any portable object that is placed in the scene.

 

For example, in the still above taken from an episode of 'Friends', almost everything you can see is a prop. The fridge, the fridge magnets, the table, the food, the chairs....

The 'set' would be the floor, the permanently fixed kitchen surfaces and the cupboards.

Think of it this way, say you bought a new house and the previous owner had taken all of their belongings with them leaving an empty shell (lets pretend you are left with fitted kitchen, bathroom and doors). The house would be the 'set'. Everything you then put in to it to decorate it - furniture, pictures, and television etc., they would be props.

In photographs even the model themselves can be 'props'. In photographs for clothing brands, the photograph is meant to display the clothes, and so the model is a prop for the clothing.

in this shot the model would be a prop.

A set doesn't have to be completely man made, in this still from Skyfall the 'set' is the grassy countryside the road and telephone pole you can see in the background, the car would be a prop, as would the clothing Daniel Craig is wearing, as Daniel Craig is playing James Bond and is not modelling the clothes, he would be an actor and not a prop.

A set doesn't have to be as expensive as building a fake flat like friends, or as large scale as using a whole countryside, it can be very basic.

In the image below the set is simple the plain wall and the floor, the carpet/rug, table and light are props.

This is all that is needed to give the impression that the woman is in a fully walled room and not an open studio against a solitary wall.


In my test shot for my still life, the grey mottled background is representing a wall, and the table is also a fixed part of the image this is my 'set'.

The skull, the fleece, bottle, sand white band and rope are all props.

 

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Still life - Jason and the Argonauts test shot 2

I was planning on shooting my final shot for my still life idea today, however, I forgot to bring the gold painted coins and the silver goblet which would have added some shine and an element of wealth to the image.

Instead I practiced my test shot again with most of my own props to see how they compared to the substitutes I had used before hand.

I used the same lighting set up as before with a large soft box above, a medium soft box to the right hand side, and a reflector front/left of the set-up.


I used flash at first, but decided to opt for constant tungsten bulbs and created a custom white balance.

As I was using tungsten bulbs, a longer exposure was necessary than is used for flash. I used an exposure of 2 seconds and ISO 100, so I needed to use a tripod; as I had a tripod I decided to set a remote shutter of ten seconds to lessen the amount of shake in the camera.

I had the right hand main light on for the whole exposure, I held the reflector and stood next to the large soft box. When the shutter opened I turned the top light on for approximately 1 second (half the exposure time).
This light hit the reflector and also shone directly down on to the props taking the hard edge off the shadows cast by the main light. I decided to do this instead of playing with the brightness of the bulb as it was easier for me to manage.

I shot in Large Jpeg and RAW file format. Having never worked with or used RAW files I had to experiment a little when I uploaded the image. I do think it has had an effect and my image was much more editable than a Jpeg file would have been.

In Photoshop I had to straighten the image slightly, I also applied the curves tool and the oil paint filter at 68%. The background is just a plain grey studio curve, but I have layered over a black and white photograph of a cloudy sky to give the mottled patchy paint work effect to imitate a wall.

Overall I am happy with the lighting and composition, the image is much brighter and cleaner than the first test shot; but the whole image is mainly grey/yellow tones. I think I need to add some different coloured items in the image, perhaps some grapes (fruit can signify wealth and fertiliy in dutch vanitas) and a red cape similar to the one Jason wore towards the end of the film, this will make a more eye catching photograph. I think that I should probably move the fleece, as the fleece is the most precious item and the main focus of the myth and might also remove or change the appearance of the white headband as it looks a bit like toilet paper!

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