Make:

The link to the PDF is broken

Thanks

Reply to this comment

Posted by: John Park on January 17, 2009 at 9:41 PM

http://cachefly.oreilly.com/make/television/03/PoleCam_FINAL.pdf

Reply to this comment

Very cool! But how useful is the remote tilt without a viewfinder on the ground?

Reply to this comment

I think you could do this for 1/10 the price if you used parts from a cheap rc toy.

Reply to this comment

Posted by: John Park on January 18, 2009 at 2:04 PM

Rob, thanks, glad you liked it. The tilt is helpful if a) you can't tilt the pole where you are, and b) you take a lot of photos, varying it a little between them. Bill Gurstelle built one with a remote view video tap, but that was more than we thought we had time to go over on the show.

Vic, great point, and I really regret that we didn't mention that on the show. Even better would have been to show me ripping apart an RC toy and using those parts. One concern is that I've scavenged a few RC cars and helicopters, and none have had beefy servomotors, just PWM controlled gearhead motors. But truthfully, we never really discussed it.

Maybe we can go open source if we get to do a second season and get input/feedback from the MAKE: community as we plan the projects for the Maker Workshop.

Reply to this comment

i used a simple paint-roller to connect a video camera to a painters pole.

see this link

images:
http://maybevideodoes.de/sites/overhead.html

video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4n_0hDK2eY

Reply to this comment

Posted by: Kalei Awana on April 9, 2009 at 1:03 AM

I'm very excited about trying this project, but I have a couple mods I'd like to get some feedback on:

Can servos be hardwired into a simple potentiometer or mini joystick rather than an RC controller? I'm thinking if you just ran wire from the servo (or possibly a simple electro mechanical switch?), down the pole to something mounted on the pole itself, you could reduce the camera operation to a single person.

I love RC stuff and any excuse to buy an extra transmitter and servos is welcome, but I like the idea of being able to handle the pole by myself too.

Also, I think it would help stabilize the pole if you added a couple of extra handles to form a T shape to allow for more extreme angles to use the rig. Obviously it wouldn't be advisable to go too extreme if the pole is at full extension, but it would be fun to be able to hang over subjects.

Thanks again for the great idea, like I said I'm dying to start, I just need to gather the funds and go to work!

Reply to this comment