Multiple Day Exposures

[Frank Petronio]

Last year a book came out from a photographer whose name escapes me, but he did long term exposures with a large pin hole camera, of construction projects and the like around NYC. His exposures took weeks or months.... the results were amazing. I should have bought the book darn it.

How might one approach doing something sort of like that? Layers of ND filters over tiny pinholes with slow ISO film... but does anyone have any rough calculations of how to extend the exposure over weeks at a time? (or do you just do an hour per day for example?)

Any other practical chit-chat relating to this might be helpful too.... I have a little project in mind that it would be pretty cool to do for.

Thanks

[jimi-the-jive]

as far as i remember those shots were done with ~52 inches of nd filters and lasted over a year in some cases

[Andrew_4548]

If exposures are lasting that long, is it general softness from the pinhole setup or seismic activity he's picking up?

The rest of the pinhole box would have to be exceedingly light-tight to withstand those times.

If you're thinking of long exposures, you'd probably need multiple cameras so you can leave them in position whilst you take another location or you'll be committed to the project for a long time and bracketing is out of the question...

If there's approx 52" of ND filters stuck on the front of the box, unless you've got some large filters, you'll create a small picture on your negative / paper due to the cut-off along the "tube." How big were the pictures you saw, Frank? Contact prints or were they enlargements from negatives?

[Frank Petronio]

He's pulling out leg about the 52 inches of ND filters. The prints in the book were pretty normal pinhole types, except an entire bldg would be built.

[Andrew_4548]

You're not thinking of the pinhole created in the aircraft hanger to take a picture of a cityscape miles away where the "film" was a sheet of material many yards wide?

[Andrew_4548]

except an entire bldg would be built.

I guess this is almost back to the camera obscura where you set up your own building pointing in the direction you want...

[Donald Miller]

Why couldn't a person permanently mount a pinhole camera somewhere and expose for a given amount of time periodically? Gosh a pinhole camera doesn't involve that much money to build and it could be weathertight. It needn't appear as anything more or less than a metal box with a cover over the pinhole. Doing a multiple day exposure this way would obviate the need for all of the ND.

[Sheldon N]

I believe you are thinking of Michael Wesley and his "Open Shutter" project. This was several photographs of up to 3 years in exposure time that documented the construction of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

I believe that they were done with a traditional view camera with a lot of ND filtration.

http://www.webkreativ.de/momenta/arc...;20version.htm

What is intriguing to me is how he got around reciprocity failure.

[Frank Petronio]

Found it:

Michael Wesely is the man!

http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/2004..._11-20-04.html

http://www.wesely.org/

http://www.wesely.org/wesely/gruppe....otsdamerplatz#

And some related stuff:

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/gadgets/g...ats-115322.php

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/12/ar...gn/12atta.html

Anyway, now I have to read up and see if it is explained in better detail than "just a long time." But if you guys have any insight...

[Jim C.]

I think it's either Michael Najjar or Micheal Wesely your thinking about, Najjar digitally manipulates his images, Wesely uses a pin hole camera.