Intentional Light Leaks.

liam.

liam.

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Liam
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Hi, I've recently got a Canon AE-1 and I've done a load of normal rolls of film and I'm fancying something different and want to get some light leaks on my latest film (i havent took it yet) but I was looking into techniques and the way thats possible is opening the back of the camera. I was just wondering if anybody knew how long to hold it open for and how often to open it up?

If anybody could help it would be a great help :))

thanks.
 
Welcome to the forum Liam

Light Leak?

As in stripe down one side or fogging the film?

If you open the back I would think it would not need to be open long, say 1sec to fog the film :shrug: but I think it would fog the only a small part of the film and not all of it.

If you really want to go down that route then you could look at removign bits of the light seals around the camera door back :shrug:, like round the door hinge or catch as that it where most light leaks when the seals fail.

If you went down that route then you would have to replace the light seals to make the camera work correctly again.

Have fun
 
Hmm. Interesting, but I would not be looking to open the back of the camera *ever* unless I was ready to remove the film. To fog individual frames remove the lens, cover the hole with your hand/fingers leaving a wee gap for some light to get past, and hit the shutter same speed as the main exposure. Clearly if you cannot double-expose then this is not an option so you will be looking at rewinding the film and starting the same roll again doing the above with each frame.

If you open the back you take the chance of losing every image unless you *know* the film is wound tightly, you start off in a dark place... open back... bring camera to the light and back to dark quickly... close back. Otherwise, you risk the fumble-effect coming into play!
 
Want light leaks? Get a Holga.

They almost leak by default, but there are plenty of modifications out there to maximise light leakage. Personally I wouldn't start randomly opening the back as you really don't know how long before the film is completely exposed.
 
I'm with Ben on that one - though the more recent Holga's seem better built than earlier ones, and neither of mine leak. It's easy enough to get the effect on 120 roll film though - just allow the film to come a little loose on the spool after removing from the camera, tape it up, then squeeze it, so that the film goes oval shaped, and light leaks past the top and bottom of the spool. Then take it home carefully and develop it quickly before it leaks again.
 
Another method would be to take the images as normal, rewind the film but not back into the cassette, remove the lens, put the camera in a black bag, box, darkroom, whatever. Set the shutter to time and experiment with a penlight torch, with colour filters for colour film obviously.
 
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You could try using some out of date film for a different effect or cross processing...
 
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