Welcome to ƒ/D! We are here to enhance and explore the art of pinhole photography. This blog, launched in April of 2015, is born from a love of pinhole photography.
Why pinhole?
In this publication, we seek to focus on pinhole not for pinhole’s sake, but for the expansion of our artistic abilities. It’s been said by many that creativity comes from restrictions – the ability to work your way around them – and there’s not many forms of photography that provide more restrictions than pinhole. You have no control over depth of field, little control over shutter speed, and can’t aim much better than a “best guess”.
In today’s world of instant digital, fed through perfectionist photoshop, pinhole photography can be seen as the perfect ying to the digital yang. Of course this is why some folks experiment with pinholing – as a rebellion to our perfectionist state of modern photography. But why do some pursue it further?
It’s meditative. It’s slow. It’s methodical. And the results can be wonderful. With a little bit of luck, the new perspective will make all your photography better.
Our Vision
While we take our mission, exploring the art of pinhole photography, very seriously; equally serious is our commitment to providing accessible information. The artists we work with won’t be limited to those artists with extensive gallery sheets. The text and descriptions will remain accessible and friendly. Pinhole photography is an inviting and weird community, and we’re here to bring more people in.
Why f/D?
Key to knowing how to properly expose an image is knowing the aperture – the size of the opening in your lens. In traditional photography, the aperture sizes are quite tame – ƒ/2, ƒ/2.8, ƒ/4, etc. But in pinhole photography, apertures get to the extreme, almost always over ƒ/125, and apertures as small as ƒ/300 are not unheard of. But where do these ƒ-numbers come from? N=f/D where N is the aperture number; f is the focal length, and D is the diameter of the aperture. Since the pinhole aperture is tiny, the resulting ƒ-numbers are huge!
Staff
Kier Selinsky is the editor and founder of ƒ/D, and a long time advocate of pinhole photography. He started making photos almost 25 years ago, and has never stopped loving the photographic image.
By night and weekend, Kier can often be seen lugging several pinhole cameras and tripods around Cleveland and other parts of Northeast Ohio. By day he’s a mild-mannered Product Manager
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Libby Selinsky is the associate editor of ƒ/D, and Kier’s long-time artistic and spiritual muse. In addition, she paints in oil and watercolor, and writes poetry and prose. Libby can often be found in the halls of the Cleveland Museum of Art and in antique shops seeking out Viktor Schreckengost works. Libby is a regular contributor to MS New Life Outlook where her writing encourages people with MS to take charge of their disease.