 Extra photos for bloggers: 1, 2, 3  |
|||
If you were to pick a themed wedding, it wouldn’t be lightsabers and Ewoks. It’d be photo-themed.
But this is no Vegas drive-through wedding. This is a glassy classy operation.
There are lots of ways to weave your favorite things into your wedding, but this DIY lens bouquet holder our pal Amber Phillips made stood out as a super original way to include your love of photography.
She’s sharing her how-to, and you don’t even have to be getting married to get in on it! You can turn your lens into a vase, planter, or a pencil-holder.
Make a Lens Bouquet Holder
p.s. Our buddies at Nations Photo Lab have 1/2 off all prints 8×10 and smaller right now. Hurry though, it ends at midnight EST!
Why It’s Cool:
Maybe you have a broken, old lens you haven’t been able to use, or maybe your local camera shop has a bin of scratched lenses that you eye every time you visit.
Whether you’re having a wedding or not, you can repurpose that lens, and that saves one more from ending up in the dump while beautifying your home all at the same time.
This project shows you how to safely hollow out your lens, so you can fill it with flowers, pencils, plants, a pile of plastic dinosaurs, or whatever else you might have around.
Ingredients:
- A broken lens
- A hammer
- Pliers
- Any kind of knife
- Floral foam (a 4″ x 4″ chunk does fine)
- Gorilla glue or hot glue
- Safety glasses
- Work gloves
STEP 1: How a Broken Lens Got Its Groove Back
Where does one pick up a broken lens? It’s as easy as searching “broken lens” on eBay.
Your local camera shop might have unusable lenses for sale, and you might also find some at garage sales or swap meets.
There are a ton of old lenses out there that are just too scratched to be used. Once you have your lens, you’re ready to start breaking it down …
Step 2: Remove the Glass
First, lay down cardboard or bubble wrap to protect your work surface. You’ll be removing the glass from the lens by hammering it.
Put on your safety glasses. We don’t recommend you touch the broken glass with your hands, but for extra precaution, put on work gloves. Or a robo-glove. Either works.
You might notice there are multiple layers of glass inside. Start breaking through the first layer of glass by hammering.
TIP: Breaking this glass is harder than you would think. The layers can be pretty thick. Be careful and watch for “bounce-back” with your hammer hand.
Use your pliers to pull out any glass that you wouldn’t want to touch with your hands.
Once you are through the first layer of glass, take a look at the lens depth and figure out if you want to go further. If so, keep on hammering.
Step 3: Cut the Foam
Once you’ve reached the depth you need, bust out your floral foam.
Take a look inside the lens, and eyeball what size you would need to cut down the foam so it fits in snug at the bottom.
Use a knife to cut it down to size.
Step 4: Glue the Foam
With a dab of glue, attach the foam into the bottom of your lens.
This’ll make sure the flowers don’t fall out while you’re holding the bouquet throughout the day.
Step 5: Arrange Your Bouquet
Once the foam is glued inside, you can start arranging your bouquet!
If you’re feeling shy about arranging your own flowers, take it to your florist, and they’ll be able to make something stunning for you.
Step 6: Put It to Use
Now what? Get married!
After you set up some chairs and get an officiant and all that.
Enjoy your day with your photo-geek bouquet, and play a prank on your photographer. What do you mean? Your lens *isn’t* supposed to have flowers in it?
Take it further
- Make yours a planter. Check out our DIY!
- Skip the foam, and turn your lens into a desk companion/pencil holder!
- If you’re not in a DIY mood, Lens Mugs are super realistic faux lenses you can use instead.
Amber Phillips is a photographer and crafter based in Talladega, Alabama. Besides photography, she absolutely loves Doctor Who.
Related posts:
- Printable, Foldable, DIY Lens Hoods, Fitted For Your Lens. Free! Paul Mutton doesn’t want you to spend twenty bucks on…
- Freelensing! Turn any Lens into a Tilt-Shift or Macro ~Reach 290,000 photo fans A great philosopher once told us,…
- How to Turn a Flatbed Scanner into a Handheld Camera for Spooky Photos! Extra photos for bloggers: 1, 2, 3 Pumpkins, witches and…
Shiny colorful reflections that change throughout the day? Yes, please. 
First, measure the space you want to cover with your curtain. For both the digital and analog version of this project, you’ll be working with 8.5″x11″ transparency pages or sleeves. 
Use an editing software like Photoshop or Gimp to create a digital layout for your images.
Once your grids are finished, print them out on transparency pages. 
Sometimes the transparency will have a larger edge on the top and bottom. 
Now, layout your sheets on a table. 
In this step, you’re going to remove the white label and three hole punch from all of the sheets except the top row.
Again, double check that you are putting your sheets back together in a consistent manner. 
Start gluing the sheets of one column together.
Once the glue has dried, it’s time to join the columns.
Now the fun part!
Because we wanted to cover a metal door, we used these clear, removable 3M hooks on the glass. 
Now you see why we left the holes on the top row, eh?
You must be logged in to post a comment.