The pinhole camera has been a classic DIY project for students discovering photography for many decades. If you want to get a deeper appreciation for the basic DNA of a camera, build a pinhole camera. Pinhole cameras are bare-bones cameras; they consist of a black box, a place to put photo-sensitive material, and a pinhole-sized opening that projects a faint image on light-sensitive material. Stripped of the bells and whistles, all cameras—film and digital—follow this design. Some (OK, almost all) cameras are more advanced. But DIY is making a comeback, especially among millennials, so, let’s make a pinhole camera!