I like doing steampunk related works with my camera. If you don't know what steampunk is, it started out with Victorian time frame but overloaded with either modern tech and/or fantasy tech. It is now wider than just the Victorian times.
I've been involved with renaissance faires since the late 1970's, and at one point I was thinking of ways to disguise my camera. I never really did anything in terms of the renaissance faire aspect, but when I discovered steampunk, I have been through numerous 'steampunk' cameras. Usually, I add various microprocessor LED projects as well.
For the big camera box, the central idea is to replace what is in a modern cellphone with steampunk gadgets. Over the years, my mascots (stuffed animal finger puppets that are in costume) have become part of the build. Generally, I try to harken back to the large format cameras with bellows and such.
Here is a picture my wife took of me before I went to the Watch City steampunk festival last May. Note, some of the electronics did not make it to the show.
- samsung - SM-A326U
- 4.6 mm
- ƒ/1.8
- 1/20 sec
- Center-Weighted Average
- Auto exposure
- ISO 1250
Here is a close up of the camera with explanations:
- OLYMPUS CORPORATION - E-M5MarkIII
- OLYMPUS M.12-40mm F2.8
- 27.0 mm
- ƒ/8
- 1/60 sec
- Center-Weighted Average
- Manual exposure
- -0.3
- ISO 320
The next festival is in 2 weeks. The current box I'm using is starting to fall apart, so I'm hoping to have finished the next generation of the box. I will be moving from the Olympus E-m5 mark I that has been the basis of the steampunk box for the last few years, to move to the Olympus E-m1 mark II. One of the reasons I am moving cameras is with the current E-m5 mark I, I get about 4 hours of runtime using 2 batteries. The E-m1 mark II is a lot easier to power externally, so I'm hoping to incorporate a power bank or Sony NP-F battery to provide more power.
Many of the critters have a little story. Since people use their cell phones to play music, I added the octopus that has a collection of instruments that some find annoying (banjo, bagpipe, harmonica, electric guitar on each tentacle). I tell people her name is Madeline Pomfrey III or MP3 for short. Now, I've thought about it, but I haven't included a speaker yet, because I'm not sure I want to hear it through out the day. Any way if the octopus plays annoying instruments, she should also play an annoying song. As a parent who has taken his child (now 34) to Mouse land (i.e. Disney World) a few times, one song that ranks up as annoying is "It's a small world". I've collected various versions of IASW done by different instruments in case I ever want to go full hog.
I'm also playing with putting an E-m5 mark III or E-m5 mark I into a Speed Graphic 4x5 large format camera.
In the past, I put an Olympus E-P2 inside of a Kodak Pony Premo 5x7 body.
I've also made a 'book of memories' by getting a book box (box in the shape of a book) that has old tymey maps on the outside, and I put my Olympus Stylus-1 inside.
I made what I called a Cambridge camera. I took a Polarid 95A body (the first mass marketed Polaroid) and I put a Raspberry Pi computer in it with the Pi camera. It is called the Cambridge camera, because Polaroid used to use Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA for their headquarters, while the Raspberry Pi was designed in Cambridge University in the UK. Unfortunately, the Pi camera is so bad indoors that I could not bear to use it.
I built a DaVinci helicopter model from a kit, and I had the 2 squirrels on it. The photographer squirrel (Nutzo) was sitting on top of my Olympus TG-2, and and I had an electronic monitor for the painter squirrel (Livenea) from the TG-2, and the idea was Livenea was painting things in real time.
Before moving to the E-m5 based steampunk camera, I used my E-3 and then E-5 as the basis of the camera. However, at 25 pounds, it became too heavy to carry all day. The current E-m5 or E-m1 based camera is probably at 15 pounds, but at some point I will have to downgrade from that.
