Anyone ever try modifying a disposable camera to shoot 4x5?

[nascarfann]

Anyone ever try modifying a disposable camera to shoot 4x5? I want to shoot 4x5, and I think a disposable camera would be a great way to do it because I like vignetting. Any advice?

 

[mshchem]

Try a $1 garage sale Polaroid pack film camera. That's a large(er) format camera. Bring a lot of duct tape

 

[Kino]

You could get 4 individual vignetted shots from 1 sheet of 4x5 with a disposable camera.

What about trying to finding a cheap press lens/shutter combo for 2 1/4 x 3 1/2 on Ebay and build a "cigar box" fixed focus camera?

 

[Kino]

Try a $1 garage sale Polaroid pack film camera. That's a large(er) format camera. Bring a lot of duct tape

Yeah, that's the ticket!

 

[BAC1967]

Any Polaroid camera that took type 40 film will hold a sheet of 4x5 film. You waste a little bit of the film but you also get the nice round corners. These cameras are abundant and cheap, I got this one for $20.

Polaroid Land Camera - The 800 by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

I took this shot with the above camera.
Mossy Creek Bridge by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

 

[Cholentpot]

Any Polaroid camera that took type 40 film will hold a sheet of 4x5 film. You waste a little bit of the film but you also get the nice round corners. These cameras are abundant and cheap, I got this one for $20.

Polaroid Land Camera - The 800 by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

I took this shot with the above camera.
Mossy Creek Bridge by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

Did you mod this or just put the film right in?

 

[mshchem]

Any Polaroid camera that took type 40 film will hold a sheet of 4x5 film. You waste a little bit of the film but you also get the nice round corners. These cameras are abundant and cheap, I got this one for $20.

Polaroid Land Camera - The 800 by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

I took this shot with the above camera.
Mossy Creek Bridge by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

Those cameras are beautiful. I remember shooting Polaroid roll film, with deckle edges on the prints. I believe Zeiss Ikon made the rangefinders. God I miss the 20th century !

 

[BAC1967]

Did you mod this or just put the film right in?

No modification, just put the film in it. I take a changing bag and an empty film box to put the exposed film in if I want to do more than one shot.

 

[Cholentpot]

No modification, just put the film in it. I take a changing bag and an empty film box to put the exposed film in if I want to do more than one shot.

How close can you get? Any good for portraits?

 

[MattKing]

Anyone ever try modifying a disposable camera to shoot 4x5? I want to shoot 4x5, and I think a disposable camera would be a great way to do it because I like vignetting. Any advice?

Most likely you won't get vignetting.
You will get a relatively tiny image on a much larger piece of film, with a bit of blur and swirl surrounding the image.

 

[BAC1967]

How close can you get? Any good for portraits?

It focuses to 3.5 feet. I haven’t done portraits with it yet, just landscapes.

 

[BradS]

I think that you'd be much better off making a pinhole camera out of a cigar box or a cut up sheet of foam core board and duct tape. Or...hey, buy a brand spanking new, commercially made 4x5 pinhole camera from the lensless camera company!

 

[Cholentpot]

It focuses to 3.5 feet. I haven’t done portraits with it yet, just landscapes.

Which Polaroid exactly is your camera? I'd like to try this.

 

[michr]

Anyone ever try modifying a disposable camera to shoot 4x5? I want to shoot 4x5, and I think a disposable camera would be a great way to do it because I like vignetting. Any advice?

If you like a little vignetting, try using a lens for the next smaller format. Like a 35mm format lens on 6x6 (cm) portion of 120 film.

But here's something I've done, but not exactly the "disposable" camera option you asked for. Buy a Polaroid Color Pack 2. You can remove the lens panel and lens with just a couple of screws. Tape the AA batteries into the connectors and you'll have a fully functional automatic shutter and focusing. The metering is calibrated for ISO 600 (I think), so you'll need to block some of the light to the photocell to get it to work with slower film. Then you can attach that panel to anything you like, including a box camera made of wood or foam board, or even a view camera. Typically, the Polaroid film was 3x4, so you might get some good vignetting at infinity on 4x5.

 

[BAC1967]

Which Polaroid exactly is your camera? I'd like to try this.

It's called "The 800". It has rangefinder focusing, those are the best ones to get. There are other rangefinder models that use type 40 film, the link below lists them by film type.

http://www.landlist.ch/landlist/landdcam-roll.htm

 

[Cholentpot]

It's called "The 800". It has rangefinder focusing, those are the best ones to get. There are other rangefinder models that use type 40 film, the link below lists them by film type.

http://www.landlist.ch/landlist/landdcam-roll.htm

Excellent, thanks!