How a Photographer Handmade His Dream 8×10 Digital camera for Everyone

Slovenian photographer and founding father of Ondu, Elvis Halilović, has unveiled the Ondu Eikan 8×10″, a brand new light-weight, handmade large-format area digicam.

Halilović tells PetaPixel the Ondu Eikan 8×10 is the digicam he has at all times wished for himself.

“I like shooting wet plate photography, this is my driving force now, and it was like I wanted to make a camera for myself. That was how I envisioned an 8×10 camera in my head,” Halilović says. “And if people like, that’s good. If they don’t, that’s also okay.”

Halilović has had the thought for the Eikan 8×10 for a few years, even earlier than he designed and launched the smaller Eikan 4×5″ digicam in 2023.

The photographer, carpenter, and digicam maker wished to see what he might do with an 8×10 digicam with out particular time constraints or limitations.

“I took my time, maybe seven or eight months of design work and preparing, and so on. And it turned out like I imagined,” Halilović says.

Halilović made an 8×10 prototype digicam approach again in 2018; it could actually even be seen within the background of older Ondu Kickstarter campaigns, however he wasn’t glad with it.

“It looked like other cameras out there,” he says.

“Then a few years later, I was hiking and the shape, these details you see now, popped in my head and I did a sketch on my phone,” Halilović says. And now, years later, the Eikan 8×10″ is right here. He went to school for industrial design, and really, when he based Ondu, the corporate was constructing geodesic domes, not cameras.

“There are a lot of large format manufacturers right now, but nobody is really trying to merge craftsmanship, design, and technology with the same kind of vibe. That’s what I try to do. It’s not just like a technical camera, it also has to look good.”

He was in a position to make it comparatively light-weight — roughly 3.5 kilograms (7.7 kilos) — by using CNC machining, laser slicing, aluminum, and 3D-printed components. As for the 3D-printed components, Ondu makes use of them just for a restricted variety of elements, akin to carriers. The body and all of the knobs are wooden and steel.

Halilović, who works intently with skilled associates to construct and assemble Ondu cameras, says he labored with about 15 totally different components suppliers for the Eikan 8×10″, together with the steel work and floor glass.

As Halilović is aware of firsthand, having been constructing and promoting analog cameras for nicely over a decade, analog images has skilled a major resurgence. There is a ton of curiosity in it, particularly for smaller codecs. So he is aware of that an 8×10″ digicam like the brand new Eikan might be by no means going to be vastly fashionable. It’s a distinct segment section of an already specialised analog digicam market.

“Most of my users for the large format stuff are wet plate photographers,” he says. “I don’t know the actual numbers, but I would guess there are maybe a few thousand wet plate photographers all over the world. It’s not a big, big thing.”

By using a comparatively compact, light-weight design, at the very least by 8×10 digicam requirements, Halilović needs individuals to make use of his Eikan 8×10″ in locations giant format cameras not often go, like excessive up into the mountains.

“The goal was simple: to create a camera that keeps the beauty of the 8×10 process intact while removing unnecessary weight and complexity. The large ground glass, the deliberate rhythm, the incredible detail, and the physical presence of the negative are all there — but in a camera designed for real use in the field or studio,” he says on the Eikan 8×10″ product page.

The digicam sports activities a foldable design with a rear vertical lock; it really works with customary sheet movie holders, has everlasting magnets for safe bellows attachment, and is constructed from powder-coated aluminum and European walnut. Halilović rigorously considers each piece of wooden, making certain the grain sample and course work by way of sturdiness and aesthetics.

The Eikan 8×10″ is kind of genuinely a murals in and of itself, and when it arrives in September, photographers worldwide will be capable of use it to create artwork of their very own.

The Ondu Eikan 8×10″ is available to preorder now, beginning at €2,500. This introductory worth is out there for the primary 20 items till June 30, or till the items promote out. The worth will then enhance to €3,050. Halilović expects orders to start supply in mid-to-late September.

The End of Ondu’s Pinhole Cameras

As Halilović prepares to launch the Eikan 8×10″ giant format digicam, he’s additionally winding down one other a part of the enterprise, the very approach that Ondu began making cameras within the first place: pinhole.

He says he has simply misplaced the need to make them, after constructing 1000’s over time. They require excessive precision and appreciable time to make. It is turning into more and more difficult to make them at a low sufficient value to maintain the retail worth accessible, so Halilović says it’s time to cease.

He has obtained many heat messages over time from individuals who have purchased his pinhole cameras and completed unbelievable work, or simply as importantly, had enjoyable.

“I get pictures in the mail, books in the mail, and stuff like that when people make images,” Halilović explains. “Every enterprise has its ups and downs, so typically you’re feeling a bit low and you then get a random letter or package deal within the mail that might enhance you up, and also you’re like, ‘This is why I do it.’”

As of writing, Ondu has about 200 handcrafted pinhole cameras remaining. It is the final batch, at least for the foreseeable future. Halilović says it’s laborious to foretell, however the plan is to deal with different tasks.

Image credit: Ondu. Wet plate images by Elvis Halilović. These moist plates weren’t captured utilizing the brand new Ondu Eikan 8×10″, however are as an alternative illustrative of the kind of photos he hopes to seize utilizing his new digicam.