Wood and magnets: Voila! A pinhole camera is born

A Slovenian designer has created a range of hand crafted pinhole cameras carved out of chestnut and maple wood and held together using just magnets. The Ondu cameras come in six different dimensions and film sizes ranging from the Leica 135 format to the 4″x5″ film holder camera. They were created by Elvis Halilovic and his brother Benjamin in a design studio just outside Velenje in Slovenia. Halilovic makes all the wooden parts of the cameras himself but some parts, like the pins that rewind the film, and the pinhole require precise CNC machining. There’s only one screw in the design and the winding pins and backplate are held in place with neodymium magnets that have a pulling force of about 0.5 kg a piece.
Prices start at £46 and the project was funded through a Kickstarter campaign that raised more than 10 times its target. He launched the Kickstarter campaign in May and raised more than £72,000 – from a target of just £6,500. Halilovic said: ‘In pinhole photography we use small tiny pinhole-sized aperture which we drill with a precision drill, that lets light through to the same material. ‘And, because it has such a high aperture, this tiny hole, it produces unique images that no other kind of photographic camera can achieve.’ ‘When you take a picture with a pinhole camera not only the photographer is involved, but also the subject.’ Because exposing images with this kind of cameras takes a little bit longer than just taking a snapshot, so the people that get photographed with these cameras get away with an experience.’ Film is loaded inside each model and a single metal screw holds the shutter in place. The smallest camera in the Ondu range is the 135 Pocket Pinhole camera that costs £46. It has a pinhole size of 0.20 mm, a focal length of 25mm, and comes with a standard tripod mount. The 135 Panoramic Pinhole costs £60 and shoots Leica format in 36mm x 24mm or panoramic double frames at 72mm x 24mm image. It also has a 0.20mm pinhole size and 25mm focal length with an added field of view of 113° for panoramic shots. Ondu’s 6×6 Pocket Pinhole costs £73 and uses 120 format film which makes the negatives 56mm x 56mm and has a 115° angle of view. Ondu’s 6×12 Multiformat camera can take 6×6, 6×9, and 6×12 images and costs £92. Halilovic claims the cameras produce similar looking results as the 135 Panoramic but with ‘much greater clarity’, thanks to the 120roll film. The camera has a pinhole size of 0.30 mm, a focal length of 40 mm and a standard tripod mount. For £106 photographers can buy a standard 4″ x 5″ film holder that is secured onto the back of any of the other cameras with magnets. This camera has a 0.30 mm pinhole, a focal length of 60 mm and a standard tripod mount. The most expensive camera in the range costs £132 and is made with two sliding boxes that hold the paper in place for the exposure. This means an image is produced before the camera film is developed into a darkroom, or before the paper in the changing bag is removed. It uses a paper format of 10,5 x 14,8cm, has a 0.3mm pinhole and a 50 mm focal length. Halilovis said: ‘Nowadays, most of us own a camera and taking a picture has become such an everyday occurrence that we don’t take notice anymore. ‘Well, pinhole photography changes that. ‘Suddenly, you remember what you were doing on the day you took the picture in detail, who approached you to ask about your camera, how you took the shot, and how you felt when you developed the film – all the things missing in today’s photography.’