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A Pinhole system for the creative!

By SFLaB in Uncategorised on 9th June 2025.

MANIA MFZ System by Ralph Man

Ralph Man from Germany contacted me and asked if I would like to try his pinhole camera system and after biting his arm off he kindly sent me a nice little set up that would confuse the hell out of me and at the same time intrigue me too! I’ve never seen a pinhole camera with three pinholes before. That said I’ve never seen a pinhole camera that offers different focal lengths before either! But here it is and after a bit of practice and a heap of expired 120 films I started to get used to it as well as see its potential as a wonderfully creative pinhole camera system!

Watch the video

In a nut shell!

What Ralph Man sent me was a pinhole camera with three different front panels, 6×6 TSP, 6×12 TSP and a standard pinhole panel as well as two different focal length blocks giving me the option to shoot 35mm, 55mm and 75mm. So far I have only experimented with the standard 35mm.

So with this set up I can shoot 6×6, 6×12 and 6×17 and all at three different focal lengths. But he also included two more front pinhole panels for shooting what Ralph Man calls “TSP”. Which stands for Twin Shot Panorama. Basically I can shoot a wide scene split over two frames using the two outer pinholes on the board.

Pretty clever too! And it’s simple once you get into it. Simply compose your scene, take one photograph with the far left pinhole, advance to the next frame and take another photograph using the far right pinhole and you should end up with a “TSP”. Like this. Two 6×6 photographs side by side.

I think I need to be a bit more creative with this feature going forward but for practice I was pleased with the results. It worked!! And I can also do this with 6×12 also using the 6×12 pinhole TSP board. That would produce a panoramic split with dimensions of approximately 6×24. Impressive if you can print that big and frame it.

What Ralph Mann says

“The Mania MFZ (Multiformat Zoom) is the first modular and fully compatible pinhole camera system. It offers a variety of film formats: from 6×6, 6×12 and 6×17 cm (with 120 roll film) up to 4×5 inches. You can also vary the hole aperture distance (comparable to the focal length of lens cameras) in 20 mm steps from 35 mm to 135 mm (theoretically to infinity). This allows you to influence the angle and perspective of your images in a targeted manner.

In addition, you can equip the camera with various front panels, which allow additional functions such as shifting or twin shot panoramas (TSP). All modules and intermediate frames are fixed with magnets and can be easily replaced. The rear panels and plan film cassette brackets are also held magnetically, so you can change them quickly and easily.

A special feature: With the 4×5 inch back you can use special screws and rubber bands (included) to even use old flat film cassettes or the LomoGraflock 4×5 Instax Back to take Fuji Instax instant photos, for example.

The combination possibilities are almost unlimited: You can decide whether you photograph wide-angled with stronger vignetting or prefer a longer focal length and less vignetting. The shifting and TSP functions can also be used flexibly to create impressive panoramas or equalised architectural shots.”

Format Inserts

These are the format inserts that were included in my package. 6×6 and 6×12.

My results

I had a mixed bag of results and I used expired film that I certainly wouldn’t use on anything important as expired film is always a lottery. But for testing cameras it’s ideal! I went through five 120 rolls of film testing this camera and I think I am now ready to load a fresh roll of 120 film for some serious results!

Portrait!

The camera has tripod plate threads for portrait and landscape so you can get creative with tall images such as these two I tried in 6×12.

6×12 Panorama

Either way these panorama shots look great, landscape or portrait. On the right subject of course.

6×6 Format.

This has to be my favourite format. I love square prints in square frames so I am very comfortable with 6×6.

6×17 super wide

I can’t even begin to think where this size would fit into any of my photography! Maybe on a bright day at a festival would look good? I say bright day as I’d want an exposure of half a second max for people motion. Just be prepared to take a lot of film! You only get 4 photographs from a 120 roll.

Sharpness and Vignetting

Of course being a pinhole camera we lose sharpness and certain pinholes give a varied amount of vignetting. That said I found my photographs to be a good sharpness for pinhole photographs so the quality of the engineered pinhole inside the boards are of decent quality. By using the telephoto boards (55mm and 75mm) you would naturally lose the vignetting but I have yet to try those boards.

But it is what it is. We expect that pinhole look with it’s ultra wide field of view, vignetting and slightly soft look.

Conclusion

What a fantastic camera system. If you love pinhole photography this camera gives more variety to be creative. And it’s well made too from solid oak and looks great. The looks I got when I was out shooting with the camera was quite funny. I am sure people thought I was some sort of dinosaur architect measuring the roads!

Ralph Man has also included a groove on the bottom of the pinhole boards for you to use filters which also comes with little magnetic pegs to secure the filter in place.

My only one gripe really, which is actually a concern, is the lack of a tensioner inside the film compartment which you find in almost every 120 classic camera. This ensures the film is being pressed against the spool as you are rewinding the film so that when you take the film out it is not slack with no light seeping into the film.

You can see the example here that is used by Ranica Pinhole Cameras. Which is something I mentioned to Ranica when they sent me their very first pinhole to try.