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This DIY large format digital camera obscura shoots the most beautiful photographs

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The lure of large format photography attracts many. Relatively few can justify the cost of pursuing it, though. Even 4×5 sheet film gets pretty expensive, and that’s the smallest of the large formats out there. What if you could make one relatively inexpensively, though, and at the same time, avoid the hassle and cost of chemicals by shooting the results on your digital camera?

That’s exactly what photography Olexiy Shportun did when he created what is essentially a large format digital Camera Obscura. A lens is mounted in the front of the unit which projects the image onto a backplate, like a normal large format camera. But in this case, the backplate is a white surface where it’s then photographed by his mirrorless camera.

I made a DIY large format guillotine shutter

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I found a WWII British Air Ministry Pentac 8 inch f2.9 lens in a second hand store about a year and a half ago. It was made under a military contract during the war and a number of British manufacturers filled this contract. The best of the lot were made by Dallmeyer, the original designer of this lens. This lens sample isn’t marked to indicate the manufacturer, and it doesn’t have a traceable serial number, so the maker remains a mystery. Like many lenses that were made for aerial reconnaissance work, they were intended to be mounted on a camera with a built in shutter. To make this lens usable in a modern sense would involve controlling the timing of an exposure. Mounting this lens in a large format leaf shutter can be an expensive undertaking, and due to it’s size, the shutter options are somewhat limited. Because I’m of dutch descent (thrifty, cheap, frugal…), I took it upon myself to find an inexpensive solution to this particular problem… Bonjour Marie Antoinette.

DIY large format scrap camera

The idea of this camera started with vintage Profile Spotlight, that I wanted to restore, but found out, that some of internal lens elements were shattered. The only lens element, that was undamaged was the front element of it. Upon some closer inspection I discovered, that this element can project image circle big enough, to cover 8X10 area.

The obvious use of it was to create large format camera. but I didn’t want to bother with large format film and other hassles of creating proper large format camera, just for this weekend experiment. So, I decided to create something like Camera Obscura and  photograph projected image with DSLR.

How I made a DIY remote mechanical cable release for my large format cameras

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If you have been reading my blog or watching my YouTube channel, you would know that I do mainly large format photography. I often take my own self portrait for using my pneumatic cable release that has a long cable and air bulb release.

However, I have always been thinking about how to make a more modern kind of remote cable release and hence this project.

How to build a DIY 4×5 large format digital scanning back from a portable flatbed scanner

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Large format film still holds a huge draw for a lot of photographers. It has a look that the relatively tiny digital sensors today (yes, even the medium format ones) just aren’t capable of. But shoot large format on film can be a laborious task. For many, the end result is worth it, but if you want slightly more immediate results, digital scanning backs are the solution.

The problem is, digital scanning backs for 4×5 cameras can be very expensive (and they’re not exactly common). In this video, Sean at Fotodiox shows us how we can turn a simple small portable flatbed scanner into a digital scanning back for a large format camera.

How to make your own DIY ground glass focusing screens for large format cameras

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These days, if you want to shoot large format, you might have difficulty finding replacement parts. Large format cameras aren’t exactly as common as they used to be, and there aren’t many companies making spare parts for older ones these days, or creating custom pieces for odd-sized cameras.

In this video, though, photographer Markus Hofstätter walks us through how we can make our own ground glass focusing screens at whatever size we need.

DIYP takes a look at the new Chroma 4×5 large format technical camera

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The Chroma 4×5 large format technical camera has intrigued me since it was announced last February. When I found out its creator, Steve Lloyd, was UK based, I got in touch to find out if he’d planned to visit The Photography Show this year. It turned out that he had, so I asked if he could bring along one of his Chroma cameras so I could see it for myself.

This photographer built her own DIY ultra large format camera from scratch

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Animation filmmaker and self-taught photographer Ursula Ferrara has made her own 16″ x 20″ camera entirely from scratch. She shares some images of the creating process, as well as the resulting photos. Her daughter, Annick Emdin, describes the magical process of being photographed by this camera, made with a lot of passion and devotion.

This video was shot on a DIY 8×10 large format video camera

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We’ve seen a few remarkable experiments with large format cameras. But young photographer Zev Hoover added something new to it: motion. He made a working 8×10 large format digital video camera, most likely the first of its kind. He shares a video he shot on this unusual camera but also talks a bit about how he made it.

How I shot this maternity portrait on a huge 1m² large format camera

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It’s not often you get to take a family portrait just before the baby decides to be born. But above all, it is not often that you are photographed with a camera of more than one square meter.

We work in a very large format. The camera is called Bertha, and it has a bellows reach of around four meters. It’s also capable of reaching a magnification of up to 3:1.

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