JOERG Beuge first discovered an interest in photography as a young boy growing up in Germany.

Settled in Enniskillen since 2002, he works only in black and white, and enjoys using pinhole cameras to capture his surroundings, with the cameras’s dramatic monochrome style showing the landscapes and architecture of the island town in an artistic light.

Here he talks to The Impartial Reporter about his background in photography, what inspires him as a photographer, and the types of camera he uses.

Are you a full-time photographer or do you have another profession too?

PHOTOGRAPHY is my hobby.

What is your background in photography?

WHEN I was a young boy, I started photography on my own. Later on, I was invited by a friend who has a studio to work with him in the lab and taking pictures.

Then I met my wife, and her father was very much into photography, so I started getting into photography again.

Are you self-taught or did you do a course/degree in photography?

I DIDN’T go to any college, I am self-taught; I just learned by doing.

Why does pinhole photography interest you?

IT’S a completely different way of photography. Digital is just click, click, click, but with pinhole photography, a picture sometimes takes up to half an hour [to take].

It’s a very slow process, and that’s the difference.

What inspires your photography?

I LIKE landscapes, especially Enniskillen, because I think some of my photos are also time documents.

Maybe in 50 years’ time, my pictures will remember some scenes from Enniskillen. With the Holga 120N camera, and pinhole photography, it’s kind of artistic.

What type of camera/equipment do you use?

MY CAMERAS include a Lerouge 45, Holga 120N and Horsley PanPin Wide. That’s just three of them, but I have so many different cameras.

I think, at the end of the day, I have more than a hundred cameras!

I also have a camera that is nearly 130 years old, and I’m going to do some pictures this year with that camera in Hungary.

How do you process your photographs?

I ONLY work in black and white. I process pictures with chemicals, the normal way, but also with coffee.

I process them with instant coffee, and the process is called ‘caffenol’.

I have a photography dark room at home. You have to take the film out of the canister in absolute darkness, and I process the negatives in red light.

More of Joerg’s photography is available to view via his website, www.studio7192.com.

PINHOLE photography has been a distinct school of photography since the mid-1850s, drawing upon an optical effect known to artists for many centuries beforehand.

At their simplest, pinhole cameras – as the name suggests – allows light to enter the camera through a small hole, casting an image onto film.

The process takes some time for the image to build up and ‘set’ on the film, which can add a dreamlike effect to the shot as it captures a scene over a period of time, rather than capturing it in an instant’s shot.

The interplay of light, and elements that may be in motion but are captured in their whole motion rather than at a moment in time (such as water and waves), thus creates a photo that is very different to conventional photography.

Such images may appear very sharp, or in soft focus, depending on the style in which they were taken, and the equipment used to capture the shot.