A homemade camera out of a jewelry box.

The pinhole juice box camera has turned out to be the first check on a list of experiments. I am truly in love with homemade cameras. They are the perfect tool in which to teach the most basic, fundamental concepts of how cameras work. In making these cameras you are able to fully understand how light, film, time, and space create a photograph. It's absolutely amazing that you are able to construct an object that permanently records images without the use of technical gadgets and pricey tools.

I took what I learned about making a camera from a juice-box, tweaked it a little bit, and made another one. I used a small jewelry box I received a gift in, and these were the results:

This is the box I used to make the camera.

This is the completed camera.

A view from my balcony.

Another view, slightly darker, which means I exposed the film for a smaller amount of time.

Me! Over-exposed?

Me II! Centered.

ME III! to the right.

My head is swimming with ideas. At the moment, I want to hold on to this and use it to teach young adults how to understand and appreciate basic means of taking a photograph ,without pulling out their camera phone, and without snapping away on their new digital dx1000ksuperduper10000billiontrillion camera.

I want people to know how photography first started, how an image is magically recorded on a light sensitive surface, and how, more than a century and half later, it has evolved.

YIPEEEEE!