CAMERAS 



Table I. — Pinhole Camera Data 



71 



Picture 



Box Cameras. — Many a photographer has started along his chosen path with a 

 box camera. A tyro can make no better pictures with an expensive camera with 

 many adjustments than he can with the simplest of all cameras — any more than a 

 beginner at the piano can make better music on a $1000 instrument than he can on 

 a secondhand battered piano. It is true, however, that the better cameras have 

 greater potentialities in the hands of even the inexperienced amateur if he is willing 

 to follow directions and to make haste slowly when it comes to trying out all the 

 adjustments. 



A box camera is distinctly a box with a lens at one end, and with some sort of 

 negative carrier at the other end. The lens is of small aperture so that all objects 

 between about 8 or 10 ft. and infinity have reasonable sharpness. The relative slow- 

 ness of the lens (//ll to //16) is not such a handicap as it was before the advent of 

 modern fast emulsions now in common use. 



The box camera is cheap; prices vary from less than a dollar up to 

 sizes vary from postage stamp size (Ulca) or less (Coronet uses 

 16-mm. film) to one-half vest-pocket and up to 3J4 by 4)-^ in. 



Some box cameras have masks in them making it possible to 

 make pictures of two different sizes on a given size of film. Some 

 cameras have built-in yellow filters; in others the front lens of a 

 simple doublet is movable so that close-up pictures may be made. 

 For example the Eastman Kodak Diway lens (Fig. 3) has a thin 

 low-power negative lens in front of the diaphragm. This lens is 

 removable by a lever, and the back component alone is focused for Fig- 3. Kodak 

 objects at 6^ ft. The depth of field at this aperture (//12.5) ^'"^^^ ^®''^- 

 is from 5 to 10 ft. The front lens is normally in place and keeps dust out of the 

 shutter. 



The cheapest box cameras have ground-glass finders; better cameras of the box 

 type have brilliant finders (see page 80 for description of finders.) 



Some modern miniature cameras are little more than box cameras of advanced 

 design, since the lens is practically fixed focus. Several 35-mm. cameras have //4.5 

 lenses which are used at all distances from 18 ft. to infinity by merely pulling the lens 

 out of the camera body to a stop position. For subjects closer than 18 ft. the lens 

 is pulled out another notch, when all subjects between 6 and 18 ft. will be reasonably 

 sharp. 



Some so-called reflex cameras are merely box cameras with a large reflection type 

 view finder. 



The great virtues of the box camera are its simplicity and its cheapness. There 

 are few adjustments. All that is required for good pictures is fair light, a steady hand, 



'^ Front lens 

 removable 



