I recently attended a workshop on alternative photography in Goa conducted by the center for alternative photography. A friend and I were the only blind participants in the workshop. The workshop is meant for sighted people. The workshop trained us to use pinhole cameras as opposed to digital cameras. Therefore, we were back to technology that was used probably in the previous century. You had no eyepiece, no flash no autofocus and no zoom. The cameras were cardboard boxes and we were using something called photo paper.

We also used cameras made out of matchboxes. They consisted of a matchbox that had a hole for the aperture. The inner tray of the matchbox had been hollowed out. There was one loaded canister of film on the left and an empty canister of film on the right. The canisters had roles of paper protruding from them. These were joined such that as you turn the filled canister, part of the film would roll onto the empty canister. There was a small piece of cardboard which I could move up and down to block and unblock the aperture.

The vOICe came in extremely handy. I was able to see what I was trying to photograph. So, I would first see what I was going to photograph using my mobile phone, then, pick up the camera, and do the needful. The trick of course was that I had to get the camera in the same position. Also, moving that piece of cardboard was a challenge but that was more because of my partially formed left palm than anything else. My instructors were extremely interested in the vOICe and, I took a good many digital shots. I have the same shots captured by the pinhole cameras. My subsequent posts will contain some of these pictures. The pinhole versions will be uploaded later.

I also had a chance to do developing in a dark room. I was wearing the video glasses at that time. There is light that emanates from these glasses so they cannot be used in a dark room.