March 1, 2010 by slau
Posted in
Hey guys,
Just wanted your thoughts on this. I'm getting the feeling that a lot of people are going with the dual-axis thing in a very specific way: Mount an altitude-rotating platform/arm on azimuth-rotating plate. Now, this may be the simplest to conceptualise, but what about removing a bit of clutter?
I was thinking about all the gearboxes and such, and then I had this flash of a MacGuyver episode where a blade keeps swinging left and right across the room. So, inspired by the Macs, this is what I was thinking of:
(just very quickly put together in a couple of minutes, don't post a "ACTUAL SIZE" sticker on it)
Instead of having most of the weight of the gear rest on the axe where one of the engines would be, why not have most of the weight supported by a stronger system, and the the altitude move by a motor around the curvy part of the support.
Again, the picture shows a full-solid support, but this could be made in quite a few different ways. Just wanted to know if you had considered other designs that the ones currently in use.
looks like it needs a little
looks like it needs a little development! =) what sort of motor/gearing are we talking about here?
There is a very specific reason to keep your tilt axis 'inline' with the camera rather than 'below' it; nodal adjustment!
Hey Milapse, Actually, this
Hey Milapse,
Actually, this design would give a much greater adjustability in terms of entrance pupil adjustment. Because the location of the entrance pupil highly depends on the size of the lens being used (at least, that's my understanding of it) and not the camera per-se, having the ability to adjust the (camera + lens)' position over the centre of rotation (this is only for azimuth rotation).
With regards to the parallax induced by altitude adjustment, yes, this could indeed make it worse, however as I said, that's a 2 minute design and with a bit more thinkering it should be possible to lower the camera platform, and end up with a ...
I FOUND IT! I just saw the design.
Ok, it's late here, so I can't do it now, but I'll definitely render it tomorrow.
Here's a second
Here's a second draft:
Again, very quick as I should be sleeping, but hoping you get the idea.
Edit 1: With an arc of that angle you get 60 degrees of movement in both directions, probably too much as the platform could be mounted at an angle, and we could start the arc at an angle as well (total 120 degrees movement). Smaller arcs could be used, 90d etc.
Edit 2: As the platform is height-adjustable, it is possible to put the entrance pupil exactly on rotation level, ensuring no parallax whatsoever. Also, if built with the appropriate material this could support a camera rig of 10 or 15kg, maybe even 40kg with only a marginal increase in motor consumption.