A Stylish Raspberry Pi Camera

July 21, 2020 by Jenny List 4 Comments

The Raspberry Pi HQ camera module is an exciting product that for the first time puts something close to a decent quality interchangeable lens camera into the hands of hardware hackers. It’s already attracted the attention of those who have a wish to explore the boundaries of camera form factors. Our latest entrant in this field comes courtesy of [BBまどーし], who has opted for a very good 3D-printed analog of a conventional compact camera.

On the front as you might expect is the module, concealed behind a smart plastic ring. Behind that is a battery compartment, concealing not the brace of 18650s or the bare LiPo pouch that you might expect, but a 10,400 mAH USB power bank. Behind that is something approaching a conventional Raspberry Pi case, designed to take a Hyperpixel screen. The battery might seem an unadventurous choice, but it serves to highlight just how much bang for your buck can now be found in compact power banks. It may not have a hacker aesthetic, but you can’t argue with its cost and simplicity.

The details are the interesting part of this design, for instance it has a standard accessory shoe printed into its top. There is also a shutter button, but they admit to not being a software wizard enough to get it working. Perhaps a quick look at this Pi Camera in a 1970s Merlin game would be in order.

An HDMI Monitor From Your Phone

July 18, 2020 by Jenny List 46 Comments

Digital video has proceeded to the point at which we have near-broadcast-quality HD production capabilities in the palm of our hand, and often for a surprisingly affordable price. One area in which the benefits haven’t quite made it to our wallets though is in the field of small HD monitors of the type you might place on top of a camera for filming. It’s a problem noted by [Neon Airship], who has come up with a solution allowing the use of an Android mobile phone as an HDMI monitor. Since many of us will now have a perfectly capable older phone gathering dust, it’s an attractive proposition with the potential to cost very little.

The secret isn’t the most elite of hacks in that it uses all off-the-shelf hardware, but sometimes that isn’t the only reason to be interested in a project such as this one. [Neon] is using an HDMI-to-USB capture card of the type that has recently become available from the usual sources for an astoundingly small sum. When paired with a suitable USB OTG cable, the adapter can be seen by the phone as just another webcam.

We see him try a few webcam viewer apps including one that rather worryingly demands a direct APK download, and the result is a very good quality HDMI monitor atop his camera that really didn’t break the bank. Sometimes the simplest of solutions deliver the most useful of results.

This is something of special interest to those of us who experiment with our own camera form factors.

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Why Are Digital Cameras Still Boring?

July 1, 2020 by Jenny List 102 Comments

In the matter of technological advancement, we are as a species, mostly insatiable. The latest toy, the fastest silicon, the largest storage, the list goes on. Take digital cameras as an example, what was your first one? Mine was a Casio QV200 in about 1997, I still have it somewhere though I can’t immediately lay my hands on it, and it could hold a what was for its time a whopping 64 VGA-resolution pictures in its 4Mb of onboard memory.

The QV200 showing off its VGA photography capabilities. It’s March 1998, and this is a brand-new PlayStation that I’m about to install a mod chip inside.

It’s a shock to realise that nearly a quarter century has passed since then, and its fixed-focus 640×480 camera module with a UV-sensitive CMOS sensor that gave everything a slight blue tint would not even grace the cheapest of feature phones in 2020. Every aspect of a digital camera has improved beyond measure since the first models in the 1980s and early 1990s that started to resemble what we’d know today as a standalone digital camera, they have near-limitless storage, excellent lenses, huge and faithfully-reproducing sensors, and broadcast-quality video capability.

But how playful have camera manufacturers been with the form factor? We see reporters in sci-fi movies toting cameras that look nothing like their film-based ancestors. What do our real-life digital cameras have on offer as far as creative body design goes?

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Scanning Analog Film For The Last Time

June 19, 2020 by Lewin Day 44 Comments

Film cameras are capable of great resolution, and for a long time were superior in this regard to their digital successors. However, it’s now possible to store digital copies of analog images in superior detail, so [Jan] built a rig to scan their photos for the last time.

The general idea is to take a high enough resolution scan of film negatives or slides, such that there is no need to rescan the images when technology moves forward. To achieve this, [Jan] decided to employ a DSLR to photograph the materials in question. To do this quickly and accurately, with minimal fuss, special lens hoods were 3D printed to hold slides in perfect register in front of the lens. With a flash to provide even light, the results are excellent. Film negatives proved harder, requiring a carefully designed transport mechanism to avoid damaging the fragile materials. With some perseverance, the final tool worked well.

It’s a tidy way of digitally archiving analog photos, and with the resolution of modern cameras, one needn’t worry about lost resolution. We’ve seen mechanised builds for handling other formats too, such as this 8mm scanner. Video after the break.

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Giant Bearing Is At The Heart Of A Camera Mount

June 15, 2020 by Brian McEvoy 9 Comments

We bet you have all some cool part in your bin that is just gnawing at you to build something cool. That doodad, possibly from a garage sale, surplus store, or clearance rack deserves a project fitting of its near-infinite potential. [isaac879] finally marries a giant ball bearing with his passion for photography in the form of a pan-tilt camera mount for his Canon DSLR. The problem with tossing your golden-ticket part into a project is that not everyone has a MacGuffin, or a brand new one might be bank-breakingly expensive, so he does us a favor and makes a drop-in replacement that you can print and fill with 6mm brass bbs. This sort of thing is why we love hackers.

The camera mount has the features we expect to see in a robust stepper mount, such as infinite spinning, time delay, and an Xbox controller interface. Inside the base is the industrial bearing or its plastic replica, and that wide base won’t be tipping over anytime soon. Gearing all around is of the herringbone style, of the type you find in classroom pencil sharpeners because they transfer power smoothly. Speaking of things going smoothly, we enjoyed his assembly montage where every part fits together perfectly and there is not a naughty word to be uttered. Just like real life.

If you like homemade bearings, check out this slew bearing that looks like it was made with Perler beads, and we have a self-aligning camera tripod mount for the photography buffs.

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External Battery Mod For Action Camera Does It Non-destructively

June 9, 2020 by Donald Papp 9 Comments

[Facelesstech] owns an SJCAM SJ4000 action camera, but the internal battery was no longer functional. Not wishing to buy a replacement and unwilling to hook up an ungainly USB cable to feed power, the solution was to design and 3D print an adapter to power the camera from a single rechargeable 14500 sized battery (which is the same size as an AA cell, and a good match for the width of the camera.)

The adapter works by mimicking the original battery, so the camera never knows the difference. A 3D-printed holder for the 14500 battery (which doubles as a GoPro compatible mount) has an extension the same size and shape of the camera’s original internal battery. The tricky part was interfacing to the power connectors buried inside the camera’s battery bay. For a solution, [Facelesstech] eventually settled on the small connectors harvested from inside a female header, using them to connect to the small blades inside the camera. We broke open a spare female 0.1″ header, shown here, to make it clear where these little pieces come from. The only other battery hardware needed are the contacts for an AA cell, but those are also easy to harvest and reuse.

The GitHub repository for the project includes STL files as well as the FreeCAD files for the parts. A video overview is embedded below.

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Building A Custom Camera Mic

May 21, 2020 by Lewin Day 2 Comments

Most consumer-grade cameras these days come with adequate microphones built in. However, as with all hardware made down to a price point, there’s room for improvement. [M. Ploegmakers] decided to whip up a better microphone setup for his Sony A6300, with the Dumbbell Mic as the result.

The microphone is based around an electret condensor element, which provides good performance at a remarkably low price. This is then integrated with a preamp circuit to bring the audio up to the appropriate level for the camera to record along with the video. Switches on board set the gain level, as well as changing the mic to operate with or without phantom power, where available. The electronics is wrapped up in a 3D-printed enclosure, designed to mount on top of the camera for use out in the field.

It took some experimentation, but now [M. Ploegmakers] has a custom mic rig that records straight into the camera, avoiding the need to splice audio and video back together in post. If your camera lacks an audio input, you might have to do a little more work to hack one in, though!