Hackerspace Camera Rig Auto-alerts The Internets When Projects Are Finished

March 10, 2011 by Mike Nathan 5 Comments

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It seems like every hackerspace has their own means of communicating status messages to their members. The hackers at [MetaLab] in Vienna have put together a rather novel way (Google translation) of letting the world know they have completed a project. While some hackerspaces simply notify their members that they are open for business, this hack takes things a step further.

When a project is deemed complete, the camera is removed from the dock, and any number of videos can be recorded. When the camera is returned to the dock, a canned introduction video is added to the recordings, then everything is automatically uploaded to YouTube. No extra time is required, no video editing needs to be done – their work hits the Internet immediately once they have finished filming it.

It’s a great idea, and something that every hackerspace should have. It would be even better to see these things installed in public areas to allow for immediate reporting of events as they occur.

If you are so inclined, be sure to check out [MetaLab’s] YouTube channel.

[via Make]

DSLR Bellows-mounted Lens Retrofit

March 9, 2011 by Mike Nathan 15 Comments

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While digging through a pile of old camera equipment, [Jake] stumbled upon a camera that belonged to his grandfather and was curious to see what sorts of images the old lens would produce. He wasn’t interested in messing around with a film-based camera for his experiments, so he needed to find a way to mount the vintage lens on his newer Canon DSLR.

After considering several options including custom machined adapters and mounting rings built from old Canon lenses, he found a much cheaper solution. He purchased a lens adapter made to mount a particular type of lens to a modern DSLR, and then modified it to fit his lens. It worked perfectly, though he admits the resulting images are not that different than those taken with his regular lens.

Underwhelmed with the images, he decided to mount the lens on a set of bellows he picked up at the local dump. It looks pretty neat, but he has yet to get a chance to take any pictures with his new setup. Hopefully we’ll see some test shots soon.

If anyone has experience with using bellows lenses on a modern DSLR, we’re always up for seeing some sample pictures. In the meantime, check out this other DSLR/bellows hybrid project we featured a short while back.

[via BoingBoing]

DIY Ring Light Takes Its Cues From Fiber Optic Toys

March 3, 2011 by Mike Nathan 11 Comments

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DIY ring light setups for DSLR cameras are nothing new around here. While most of them rely on an array of LEDs or a mirror-based light tube, [Wolf] had a different idea. He figured that since optical fibers are made specifically for transmitting light from one place to another, they would make a perfect medium for constructing a ring light.

Since he was using the camera’s built-in flash to power the ring light, he was able to provide a function that few other DIY ring lights do: proper flash compensation. Typically, a self-made ring light flashes at one set brightness, regardless of how much light is actually required to compose the image.

The construction was relatively simple, albeit time consuming. He procured a set of fiber optic cables that had been melted together into 150 small bundles, which he then glued to an acrylic ring that he fabricated. The end result isn’t the most aesthetically pleasing ring light we’ve ever seen, but it’s the pictures that matter at the end of the day. As you can see on his site, they speak for themselves.

Looking to build your own ring light? Check out a couple of other projects we have featured in the past.

LED Artwork Disappears Right Before Your Eyes

March 2, 2011 by Mike Nathan 47 Comments

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If you walked into an art gallery and saw nothing but blank canvases lining the wall, you might be compelled to demand your money back, or assume that you had discovered the world’s laziest artist. If this gallery happened to be displaying work by [Brad Blucher and Kyle Clements] however, you would be mistaken.

These two artists have collaborated to create a series of works titled, “Take a Picture“. Each picture they have built is constructed to look like an empty canvas when viewed with the naked eye. If you were to take a picture of the canvas with your cell phone or digital camera however, a whole new world would open up in front of your eyes. Their artwork is constructed using infrared LEDs, which cannot be seen with the naked eye, but are visible to nearly any CMOS or CCD sensor on the market. The images range from simple smiley faces and objects to abstract geometric shapes.

It’s a very simple, yet novel approach, and we happen to think it’s pretty cool. The artists have not said what they have planned for this project in the future, but we’d love to see it expanded using larger LED arrays to display higher-resolution images, or even short movies.

Keep reading to see how they went about creating these works of art as well as a promo video demonstrating the effect.

Continue reading “LED Artwork Disappears Right Before Your Eyes” →

Power Adapter For Digital Cameras Without An External Jack

February 20, 2011 by Mike Szczys 21 Comments

[Kusnick] is into using digital camera rigs for book scanning. The problem is that keeping the batteries charged is a pain, but there’s no external AC adapter jack which would allow him to use the mains. His solution was to build his own adapter to replace the batteries.

There are some fancy book scanning setups that allow you to just flip through the pages, but it’s much simpler to build a rig that uses two cameras. [Kusnick’s] setup is the latter, which means he’s found two inexpensive cameras that don’t need to be mobile. The first attempt at making an adapter featured a block of acrylic with the positive and negative contacts connected to a shielded cord which he then hooked to an external supply. The camera would come on and then turn off citing that the cameras were “for use with compatible battery only”. Turns out there’s some type of verification circuit built into the proprietary batteries. But the solution to that came quite easily; remove the circuit board from the battery and insert it in the adapter to trick the camera.

[Thanks Daniel]

Stackable Macro Photography Rig

February 19, 2011 by Mike Szczys 14 Comments

When taking macro photographs you lose a lot of clarity due to a reduced depth of field. One way to get sharp pictures is to take multiple shots at slightly different distances from the subject and then stack them into one image. There’s software to do this for you, but you still need a set pictures to start with. [Dsvilko] built this setup to easily capture a set of macro images.

He’s using the internals from an optical drive as a sled to carry the subject. A PICAXE drives the stepper motor that moves the carriage, which takes input from an IR remote control. This turns out to be a fantastic method as the sled can move in 0.2mm increments. After he’s got his set of images he uses Zerene to stack them together.

Bonus points to [Dsvilko] who used Linux command line tools to edit together the demonstration video embedded after the break.

Continue reading “Stackable Macro Photography Rig” →

Cyborg Camera Mask

February 18, 2011 by Kevin Dady 8 Comments

[Ryan] whipped up this robotic masquerade mask to wear to his wife’s art opening / masquerade party, and its pretty wild. The prominent feature of this mask is a scavenged lens assembly from a typical point n shoot style camera, which is still connected to its electronics so it can go through its off and self check functions. You cant see through it, but with moving parts and a red LED inside, it does create an awesome cyborg type appearance,

The movement of the lens assembly is triggered by a thermistor inside of the mask’s nose piece, warm air exhaled onto to it for a given period of time changes the resistance and is monitored by a micro controller, which seems to act like a toggle style switch.

While there is not a build log, parts list, or many details, the schematic is provided for you to look over if you want to try and make your own.

Continue reading “Cyborg Camera Mask” →