Macro camera stand

**BobL** · 17th September 2009, 02:37 AM

I'm posting this here because only people who are interested in Photography are probably interested in something like this.

The whole gizmo is designed to provide good lighting and hold a camera steady pointing straight down so that a sharp macro shot can be obtained. Using a macro lens requires good lighting which in this case is provided by 4 x 120w compact fluoros. Using an appropriate white balance on the camera enables lighting artifacts to be minimized.

Here is a closer up so you can see a bit more detail.

The vertical stand is made from a piece of 40 x 44 x 3 mm Unstrut Ally rail.
The lighting arms are made from 25 x 3 mm SHS ally
The camera Bracket is made from a combo of 25 mm SHS and 6 mm ally plate.

Here is a close up of the camera bracket

The bracket has a drive mechanism that can used to manually raise and lower the camera.
The drive wheel is made from Black nylon and has two large o-rings that make contact with the vertical stand. This shows how the drive wheel is held onto the shaft.

To adjust the camera height the T-Track nuts A and B are loosened. The camera won't fall for the reason described below.

The bracket is moved into place by hand, the camera and bracket are counterbalanced by a 2.2 kg lead ingot riding inside the vertical ally rail and connected to the camera bracket by a stainless steel trace wire shown at D.
When the approximate height has been reached the T-Track nuts A and B are slightly tightened enabling the O-ring drive to engage and fine height adjustments can now be done using the silver rotary handle C. Finally T-Track nuts A and B are locked down.

Here is a close up of the stainless trace and the teflon pulley that is fixed at the top of the vertical stand.

The counterweight was cast to fit neatly inside the vertical bracket - details here.

Here is a pic of the counterweight before being painted.

The base is an old veneer covered chipboard door.

The vertical is fixed to the base using 6 mm ally plate. The plate is fixed to the vertical by drilling a 19 mm hole across the vertical at A (you can just make out the end of the hole in the photo near A) and passing a solid 19 mm diam ally lug through the hole. The lug is drilled and tapped and provides the thread for the 8 mm allen bolts to pass through the base and into the lug. Tightening the allen bolts pulls the whole thing together very nicely.

Similar lug type arrangements are used for the lamp brackets.

Everything is ally except the 8mm rods on the individual lamp arms.
I also made the lampshades out of 0.5 mm All sheet.

The whole lamp bracket is adjustable in every orientation. Vertical height adjustment is done via this clamp which grabs onto the vertical stand.

The clamp is steel and can be raised and lowered independently of the camera.

One more pic of the whole shebang!

I'm quite please with the way it has turned out, there's just one thing that really bugs me and that is the counterweight rattles when the height is adjusted!
Dang!

**Pusser** · 17th September 2009, 05:33 AM

Many thanks. Good looking stand.

**kevjed** · 17th September 2009, 07:58 AM

That is one well resolved copy stand Bob. Just out of interest what was the weight of the counter weight you used in the end? Nice pics too.
Kevin

**BobL** · 17th September 2009, 09:26 AM

Thanks Guys.

Originally Posted by kevjed

That is one well resolved copy stand Bob. Just out of interest what was the weight of the counter weight you used in the end?

The weight is 2.2 Kg which is equal to the weight of the camera bracket, D50 camera (D20 shown in pics) and a 100 mm macro lens. The bracket can be set to have a fair bit of friction so it can deal with quite a bit of weight differential without sliding by itself under the reaction to the counterweight.

Nice pics too. Kevin

Thanks - i forgot how hard it is to take good photos of something that is matt black

**BobL** · 19th September 2009, 01:38 AM

Here is a pic of a 10 mm long ear ring taken with the macro stand.
F32, 0.5 sec, 200 asa, Canon D50 with 100 mm (160 mm equivalent) f2.8 macro lens.

The setup is shown in this pic.

Live video preview and remote camera operation via laptop - image stored directly on laptop - it sure is a fun bit-o-kit to drive. Original pics are huge (15 Mp) so had to shrink them considerably to fit on here - can probably blow them up even a little more on the macro stand but the image becomes harder to get sharply in focus.

Some more macro photos of chain saw chain cutter s taken are shown in the Milling section - see this thread.

**pawnhead** · 24th September 2009, 02:15 PM

Wow that's an incredible piece of precision workmanship there Bob. It even has a counterweight

. Are you going into the camera stand business? Because there'd be a market for something so professionally put together I reckon.

It makes my slapped together pano stand look like a real joke.

Some nice macro shots there.

**BobL** · 24th September 2009, 02:31 PM

Originally Posted by pawnhead

Wow that's an incredible piece of precision workmanship there Bob. It even has a counterweight

. Are you going into the camera stand business? Because there'd be a market for something so professionally put together I reckon.

It makes my slapped together pano stand look like a real joke.

Some nice macro shots there.

Thanks PH. If you were able to look closer you would see it does not quite have the precision that would be possible with serious quality metal work milling equipment. I'm doing most of the work by hand or using woodworking tools, for sample I cut the aluminium tubing with a table saw. I spend a lot of time filing and sanding rough edges and of course several coats of paint hides a multitide of sins

**pawnhead** · 24th September 2009, 03:46 PM

Originally Posted by BobL

Thanks PH. If you were able to look closer you would see it does not quite have the precision that would be possible with serious quality metal work milling equipment. I'm doing most of the work by hand or using woodworking tools, for sample I cut the aluminium tubing with a table saw. I spend a lot of time filing and sanding rough edges and of course several coats of paint hides a multitide of sins

Yeh I've got the same problem with precision, on a project I'm working on at the moment. Back in 2007 I made a whole stack of little 'Burr' puzzles for Christmas presents. About fifty in all, but I couldn't get the desired precision with all of them and some of them were a bit sloppy when fitted together.
I was planing down the square rods with an electric planer, but they really need to be exact in their dimensions, so I think I'd need a thicknesser if I can't be more careful milling down the stock. Cutting the notches in them is no problem with my Ozito SCMS, but it's the dimensions of the stock that makes some of them fit together poorly.

Anyway, I've just about given them all away now, and there's lots of others who I'd like to give them to. It's easy to make a whole stack of them, and I'd like to make a hundred of them next time. I've improved the template that I made for a little box that I put the pieces in, and using laminated photo-paper, it turns out to be a very professional looking little puzzle, and I personalise each one with the name of whoever I'm giving them to.
Only two people have solved it on their own so far, and I'm not even one of them myself.

Here's the thread I made about it back in 07.
They're a great little gift, and everyone I've given them to is impressed, so if anyone wants to make their own, then here's the new box template I've made if anyone wants to grab it and modify it:

I made that one for my Solicitor, Warwick Dunn, and I could post exact dimensions of the stock and notch positioning, and I'll PM you the solution if anyone is interested in pumping them out themselves.

You might just want to make one for yourself, and have a go at putting it together. I spent two hours trying, and I'd have liked to have solved it myself, but Christmas was coming up, and I had to make certain that they'd fit together before I started my production run.
So I had to pull a 'cop out', and I checked out the solution.

BTW, I can modify that template for anyone who's not interested in me or my solicitor, or my crazy monkey Apestack.

I can put whatever names you want on it if you're not practiced at photo editing.

**texx** · 24th September 2009, 06:46 PM

just thought i would mention how i built one years ago when i was into 35mm in a big way .
i converted one of my old enlargers into a copy stand ( same thing basically )
just used the enlarger base and collum complete with up down adjusters and mounted a nikon fe2 onto where the enlarger would normally mount then added the lights worked like a charm

**Sawdust Maker** · 30th September 2009, 10:29 PM

Bob

Very nice set-up
might just have to 'borrow' some of those ideas

I was going to ask whether that was a 20D, then you answered the Q.
How's the 50D compared to the 20D?
I've the 20 and am trying to convince the chancellor that the 50 is vital to our well-being

**BobL** · 30th September 2009, 11:04 PM

Originally Posted by Sawdust Maker

How's the 50D compared to the 20D?
I've the 20 and am trying to convince the chancellor that the 50 is vital to our well-being

Cheers Sawdust maker.

I haven't really used the 50D much but so far I've noticed

Pro's
1) faster all round
2) It does not seem to get lost as easily when auto focussing.
2) Less CCD noise
3) The LCD is real nice but it chews more power.

Cons
1) More battery hungry, 400 shots v 750 for the 20D. Some of this is the bigger LCD but even when I don't use it it seems to use more power.
2) Needs bigger storage media to shoot RAW

The 15 V 8 Mp difference is hard to decouple from the improved noise of the 50D and the quality of any lenses used. Any difference is only noticeable in really good lighting. They are both really good cameras and like all DSLRs cameras above 6Mp the limitation is generally not the camera.

Good luck with the chancellor!

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