Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day was celebrated on Sunday 29th April 2018, and photographers across the globe took the opportunity to get out and about with their pinhole cameras. Lens-less photography comes in all varieties from analogue homemade tins or boxes, bespoke wooden pinhole cameras, to digital conversions. My favourite choice of camera for the day was my old Polaroid Pinhole 100 camera. The real joy of experimenting with this camera is that it uses an analogue Type 100 instant peel-apart film, so for creative exposures the print can be viewed following just 60 seconds development. Negative and print sheets are sandwiched together in the film pack, exposed in camera before being pulled out through rollers, which spreads a pod of chemical gel between the two sheets, developing the image. The sandwich is then pulled apart to reveal a processed print and negative sheet.
Sadly Polaroid instant Type 100 film has not been in production for some years now, and Fuji have just recently discontinued manufacture of their last film in this format. Once my refrigerated expired stock of these films is finally used up, this little camera will become redundant, without some engineered structural modification to use an alternative film format. One slight positive will be that I will then be able fit some food back in my fridge, but that is only if I do not manage to locate a further source of film stock to fill it with!
For the past few years here in the UK it seems to have been grey and wet weather for Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day, and this year was no different, but shooting beneath a tree canopy helped to shelter camera and instant prints from the worst of the rainfall. Despite the overcast skies, I was still achieving 6-8 minute exposures on the Fuji made film. Multiple exposures under the trees created an ethereal image with subtle layers and an impression of movement from the passage of a breeze through the leaves.
Direct scans from the Fuji fp-100c type 100 instant print images shot on 29th April for Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day. One image will soon be uploaded to the WPPD gallery: http://pinholeday.org/
