We like cameras here at Hackaday. We like them a lot. But until now that liking has never extended to liking their taste. A build from [Dmitri Tcherbadji] could change all that though, and he’s created a working Fuji Instax Square camera made from gingerbread.
To look at, it’s a straightforward box camera, albeit one made from sheets of gingerbread stuck together with what looks like icing. The film rests in an off-the-shelf development unit but the rest is edible, including unexpectedly the lens which is made of sugar glass. The photos it returns are definitely somewhat cloudy, but that it works at all is a significant feat.
While it’s an unconventional choice it’s clear that gingerbread, or at least a baked material similar to it, could become a useful tool in a maker’s arsenal. In this case it’s light-proof, but were instantly curious about how well a moulded piece of dough might hold its shape when baked. He reports the gingerbread expanding in the oven, however we’re guessing that tuning the quantity of raising agent could help.
Home-made cameras have featured here many times, but Instax seems to pop up most often as a hacked in replacement for obsolete Polaroid packs.
I’m reminded of the old Russian proverb: “The marvel is not that the bear dances well, but that the bear dances at all.”
Is there such a thing as edible film? Maybe not real practical film, but like, a plant dye that could capture an image by fading during an extremely long exposure?
Maybe one that could be “developed” with laser pulses to char the already dark areas(Not that eating charred stuff is particularly healthy)?
Chlorophyll works partially. There was a video by applied science about this a couple weeks ago. Maybe you could build a camera from salad?
A future challenge for the Great British Bake Off? “Paul and Prue would like you to bake an edible camera. Your camera should be made of gingerbread and capable of taking snapshots”
+15 points for snorted laughter
Hmmm, I guess a Box Brownie wouldn’t be possible…?
Very good! And there are probably a good few folks here who won’t get the reference.
I used to have a Brownie – mine was pretty much cube-shaped.
I’d make a silicone mold from a lens then pressure cast the liquid sugar in it to get the best optical performance possible from the material.
I would think a gelatin lens would work better than sugar
I had expected from the headline to read about a camera in a pill for noninvasive medicine. This is a very unexpected twist.
Kitchen cupboard photography, absolutely love this concept. That you for the inspiration.
Article said “He reports the gingerbread expanding in the oven, however we’re guessing that tuning the quantity of raising agent could help”.
I say “Or, you could just, you know, _mill_ the gingerbread”. Machining baked goods – sounds like something right up Hackaday’s alley.
Side note to editors: could you, pretty please, have someone set up the site so once we’ve entered our name and email info we can submit multiple posts without having to do it again? Having to enter that info _every_ time we comment or reply is a real drag.
Milling gingerbread is very much like milling compressed binderless sawdust. And once you remove the skin, it gets fragile fast.
You could make the entire camera out of sheets of isomalt, just dye the body jet black.
Hey guys, I noticed there are some unanswered questions here about this project. I’d like to answer them for you:
– Yes, I used a silicone mold for the sugar lens, it’s not special by any means, just a candy maker’s tool.
– Yes I “milled” the gingerbread after it came out of the oven. I used cheese grater tools and some fine files (which I washed well). Gingerbread recipe I used is extremely strong and I was able to file it down to quarter-inch thickness with no issues or crumbling.
– The lens indeed can use some work, and so could the shutter. That’s for next year.
Very curious about edible film — I’m gonna have to look that up. Since this camera can have a very large aperture, it can collect a lot of light, which could make it work (this is one of the challenges with working the shutter as it’s very easy to over-expose an ISO 800 Instax film).
Love the puns here 😂
” The photos it returns are definitely somewhat cloudy”…. so you could say thw images are froated then?
*frosted*