"Wood" Camera Project. 1998 { 6 images } Created 17 Sep 2020
“Wood Camera” 1998
The first four cameras I made were experimental and specifically made to play with the properties of pinhole photography.
In pinhole photography objects right in front of the pinhole will be just as in focus as an object 20 miles away.
So I made the Wood Camera to play with pinholes infinite focus.
In 1998 I was spending a lot of time at the Saline Valley Hot Springs in Death Valley, California. It’s one of my favorite places in the world. To get to the hot spring you need a high clearance, four wheel drive vehicle, and navigate a 4x4 trail for about 50 miles. During one of the trips in I stopped at an abandoned mine from the 1800’s, set up my climbing gear and repelled about 150 feet down into the shaft. At the bottom I found some old metal parts, cool old wood and a rusted chunk of metal that was once a handgun. I put the items in my backpack and ascended back up my ropes.
Back in my studio I laid out the items from Death Valley and decided that’s what I was going to make my next camera out of.
The Wood Camera is a 4”x5” film camera that features a removable copper frame in front of the pinhole aperture. The copper frame has a sheet of glass mounted in the front and back, leaving about 1/4” space in the middle. I would use this space to mount objects and float them in the middle of the frame. When the frame is in its holder in front of the camera, the object in the frame looks as if it is floating in the photograph, and is still in focus just as objects that are miles away. Pinhole magic!
The first four cameras I made were experimental and specifically made to play with the properties of pinhole photography.
In pinhole photography objects right in front of the pinhole will be just as in focus as an object 20 miles away.
So I made the Wood Camera to play with pinholes infinite focus.
In 1998 I was spending a lot of time at the Saline Valley Hot Springs in Death Valley, California. It’s one of my favorite places in the world. To get to the hot spring you need a high clearance, four wheel drive vehicle, and navigate a 4x4 trail for about 50 miles. During one of the trips in I stopped at an abandoned mine from the 1800’s, set up my climbing gear and repelled about 150 feet down into the shaft. At the bottom I found some old metal parts, cool old wood and a rusted chunk of metal that was once a handgun. I put the items in my backpack and ascended back up my ropes.
Back in my studio I laid out the items from Death Valley and decided that’s what I was going to make my next camera out of.
The Wood Camera is a 4”x5” film camera that features a removable copper frame in front of the pinhole aperture. The copper frame has a sheet of glass mounted in the front and back, leaving about 1/4” space in the middle. I would use this space to mount objects and float them in the middle of the frame. When the frame is in its holder in front of the camera, the object in the frame looks as if it is floating in the photograph, and is still in focus just as objects that are miles away. Pinhole magic!
