Crowd funding is becoming increasingly popular among creatives. With more sites sprinting up and more artists asking for funds, Don’t Take Pictures spotlights projects that benefit the arts community.

This month’s crowd funding roundup presents the first cardboard vintage camera.

Jollylook: The First Cardboard Vintage Camera

Analogue cameras make wonderful teaching tools for those interested in the properties of light, optics, and engineering. When Oleg Khalip taught his son how an analogue camera functioned, he wondered how the camera’s packaging itself could be transformed into its own camera. An inventor with over 30 years of experience designing engineering production facilities, Khalip turned this brief lesson into Jollylook, the first cardboard vintage camera.

Jollylook is made entirely from recycled paper and cardboard, while maintaining the functions of a metal and plastic camera. Jollylook uses “less materials than used in the packaging of a regular camera” and supports Instax mini film.

The simple folding paper camera for instant photography boasts a manual shutter and a lens with a focal length of 110mm. The lens’ apertures range from f/8 to f/64, and the lens can be moved out of the way entirely if the photographer wants to shoot through a pinhole. The viewfinder is a Fresnel lens pulled upwards out of the camera body.

Khalip modeled the design off of a vintage camera that could be collapsed for easy portability—Jollylook’s design is only slightly larger than an iPhone’s box. The environmentally friendly construction, ability to produce instant photographs, and affordable price (Project backers who pledge $29 or more will be shipped a Jollylook instant camera and a pack of Instax mini film.) opens many possibilities for teaching photography to students worldwide.

Read more about Jollylook on their Kickstarter page.

There are 3 days left to fund this project.

Do you know of a crowd funding project that benefits the art community? Let us know at info@donttakepictures.com.