Show Home Made Photo Gear

[steveadams]

Here is another simple one that I found to be necessary. A small steel base to put on the Olympus Air. It allows to set the camera down and have it level. It also makes it easy to determine what's fairly level when hand holding for shots. The base has been powder coated (a thin plastic coating that is baked on) black to stop rust and improve looks.

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[TNcasual]

My beautiful wife put together a padded insert that I use in a bag I already had. It holds three lenses. She also took two 'belts' (that is what they were sold as at the thrift store) and created a camera strap for me. It is very comfortable.



And that's a Oly 12-40 that a friend is letting me borrow on my E-M10.

 

[Brian Beezley]

My beautiful wife put together ...

She has a great sense of color. Do you ever pass the camera to her?

Brian

 

[TNcasual]

She has a great sense of color. Do you ever pass the camera to her?

Brian

Then she might know what it all cost!

 

[CharlieL]

Here is a little c-clamp thingy, I use it for various camera related things, like holding a led light, or microphone, or holding the camera. I mainly use it when making how-to videos in the shop.

It is just a little clamp with a couple of 1/4-20 bolts welded to it, paired with a little ball head.

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[adammaniam]

After posting the robberfly macro shot below, I was asked by @barry13 to post my diffuser setup in this thread. Here goes.

A photo of the diffuser is below, followed by a sample shot taken with the 60mm and the diffuser. In terms of how I made it:

1. I followed the dimensions you can see in the video at mirrorlessmacro.blogspot.com
2. However, instead of using a soldering iron, I just used a whole puncher to punch the holes in the piece of translucent plastic which is the forward-most piece in the diffuser.
3. I then modified it by making 2 identical pieces using packing foam. I then put those immediately behind the piece of translucent plastic.
4. This means there are a total of 3 pieces in the diffuser.
5. I also leave the white plastic diffuser that came with the flash (Meike MK-320) on the flash. The flash is plenty bright enough for me so I don't presently see the need for a box to prevent light leakage.

Hope this is useful.

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[Harvey Melvin Richards]

This is a flash bracket that I made. It is very useful for shooting night time spider portraits with the 40-150 F/2.8.

Flash Bracket by Harvey Richards, on Flickr


Flash Bracket Handle and Jasper by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

Flash Bracket and Handle by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

I have a couple of these Universal Arca plates. They are useful for mounting strange light set ups or holding odd items using a tripod mount. They can also extend the above flash bracket. They have 1/4-20 threaded holes alternating with 0.261" thru holes, 3/8" on center. The leading edges have a beveled recess to press down the safety pin on my tripod.

Universal Arc Plate by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

Arca Plate Safety Release by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

 

[oldracer]

Harvey's pretty flash bracket reminded me that I have another gadget I had posted in another thread that might also be of interest to denizens of this thread:

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This is an L-bracket that installs onto a body that already has an Arca plate mounted. I don't like conventional L-brackets because they increase the bulk of my cameras and also require removal of the plate that is normally on the cameras. My plates are installed with blue loctite to minimize the possibility that they will loosen, so changing them is a hassle.

Since I am fortunate to have a 3-axis DRO precision mill, I used it to cut down both the width and the thickness of a locking-lever Chinese clamp from eBay. I then attached it to a conventional L-bracket with a couple of screws from the bottom. The bracket as it sits does not block the battery door of my GX7 or my GX8 but it would have been easy to whack some length off the bracket as necessary.

The result is heavier and thicker, so going this route is obviously a tradeoff. But I can add or remove the L bracket without disturbing the plate on the camera. Acratech makes a similar item: Universal L Bracket Maybe others do too.

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

Harvey's pretty flash bracket reminded me that I have another gadget I had posted in another thread that might also be of interest to denizens of this thread:

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This is an L-bracket that installs onto a body that already has an Arca plate mounted. I don't like conventional L-brackets because they increase the bulk of my cameras and also require removal of the plate that is normally on the cameras. My plates are installed with blue loctite to minimize the possibility that they will loosen, so changing them is a hassle.

Since I am fortunate to have a 3-axis DRO precision mill, I used it to cut down both the width and the thickness of a locking-lever Chinese clamp from eBay. I then attached it to a conventional L-bracket with a couple of screws from the bottom. The bracket as it sits does not block the battery door of my GX7 or my GX8 but it would have been easy to whack some length off the bracket as necessary.

The result is heavier and thicker, so going this route is obviously a tradeoff. But I can add or remove the L bracket without disturbing the plate on the camera. Acratech makes a similar item: Universal L Bracket Maybe others do too.

That looks similar to an L bracket that I made, although it was made for a different reason. I made mine to work in a Peak Design Capture Clip that is attached to my backpack strap. I put my camera on it with a wide angle lens and to a time lapse of a bike ride. I need to modify it so that the angle is adjustable so my field of capture is more in front of me.

M1014484 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

Arcatech sure doesn't give that bracket away.

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

My driver side cup holder was loosing the spring on the rubber finger that hold the cups secure due to my camera adapter being in it most of the time. I modified my cup holder camera mounts so they will key into the cup holders and not rotate. I cut angled slots every 120°. An added bonus is the mounts now fit in my other cup holders, plus they resist rotation better.


EM126997-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

 

[NCV]

Here is my negative/slide duplicator. I got most of it made up in the workshop where I worked. I use my old enlarger negative carriers with a bit of translucent plastic attached at the back.

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Here are the results. Italy 30 years ago

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[Mike Wingate]

Very interesting. I shall follow and post.

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

Some new car window mounts. I have a Nikon car window mount for a spotting scope. I find it to be marginal at best. I thought that I would try something similar for my 300 mm lens.

This is made from a 1" thick piece of UHMW. It just has a cheap ballhead on it. I didn't wand a rigid mount, I wanted something that would work similar to a monopod.


EM123957-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

This put the lens further away from me that I liked, so I decided to try a V block.

I made a couple of sizes then narrowed down the top so that I could easily rotate the lens.


EM123955-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr


M1024285-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

 

[Pav]

When you can be bothered or have the time, I'd be very interested to see how you did it

I call the rifle side fitting a "barrel." I don't remember the official name. Here's an old picture:

View attachment 495383​

The barrels are designed to be inlet flush into a rifle stock. They have a hole in the closed end that is countersunk to take a wood screw to anchor the barrel.

I've used this type of pigtail for attaching straps to cameras for years. Two key things: (a) The cord or wire is as small as possible so it doesn't interfere with my hands when shooting. In this particular photo, I am using a loop of stainless steel fishing line rated 80#. (b) The pigtail is long enough that the attachment hardware hangs below the camera and completely out of my way when I am shooting. There are a couple of vendors that use this type of pigtail design for their strap attachments but neither has figured out that their pigtails are too short.

The fittings are fairly standardized and available from several manufacturers. The ones I use are by "Uncle Mike's." These things are steel and beyond overkill in strength for our little cameras. Uncle Mike's seem to be the lightest weight. I buy them from Brownell's --- lots of neat stuff to drool over in their catalog: UNCLE MIKE'S QUICK DETACH 100 SLING SWIVEL | Brownells

If anyone gets serious about trying this system, please post a note here. I can give you some tips and tricks learned the hard way. I just don't want to type all that stuff now if no one is interested.

 

[oldracer]

When you can be bothered or have the time, I'd be very interested to see how you did it

OK, here's a little bit more:

A quick cell phone picture of my current "pigtail" setup:

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As previously mentioned, the pigtail is long enough to hang below the camera body, moving all the hardware out from under my hands. The only other bit I think I haven't mentioned is the very small welded stainless ring that connects the pigtail to the split ring on the camera body. This turns out to be necessary because after a time the sharp cut ends on the split ring will chew through even the stainless steel fishing line that I am now using. The split rings (#7 size) and the welded rings (#5 size), the wire line and crimp ferrules are very cheap from fishing tackle suppliers. I think I bought 100 split rings for three or four bucks.

In this shot there are two separate lengths of stainless fishing line. To an engineer this is kind of silly, as the line is good for at least 80 pounds. I carried the cameras for a year with just one length but it always looked so fragile to me that I doubled it up for good luck.

There is a tricky bit with the barrel. It is countersunk inside for a flat head screw and when that screw is in place there is almost zero clearance between the head of the screw and the quick-release swivel. This make connecting the pigtail difficult. So what I do is use a 3/8" end mill in a drill press to flatten the countersink area, leaving more clearance. For this purpose, Chinese junk is probably completely adequate: 3/8" High Speed Steel HSS 4 Flute Straight End Mill Cutter Totk | eBay It may be possible to make this cut with the end mill chucked into a hand drill motor, but I don't think it would be easy. Best if you have a drill press or a friend with a drill press.

Once I have flattened the bottom of the barrel, I use an S-shaped piece of wire to connect the pigtail material. I have frequently used light nylon cord as pictured, which has a softer feel than the stainless wire. YMMV.

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The wire is 0.041" stainless aircraft safety wire, which I happen to have on my bench. Any stiff wire should work, but I'd avoid soft wire like copper. After I've connected the pigtail to the S-anchor I epoxy them in place at the bottom of the barrel.

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Hope this helps. Any questions, feel free.

 

[4Paul]

Miniature LED-Projector for the oblique illumination of opaque samples.

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Here a 1870 vintage Victorian microscope slide of injected and corroded glomeruli of a human kidney.

 

[The Grumpy Snapper]

Ground pod with the long legs on. From my film days so designed to support a 600mm in those days. I don't think I ever used it during my brief foray with an 800mm. The triangular aluminium plate was an offcut from a local engineering company. 30 minutes to drill and tap 4 holes and take any sharp edges off. I gave it to a friend who worked at Rolls Royce to be powder coated.

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[barry13]

A simple but useful hack:
Manual Focus tip

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

I have been slowly making an angle bracket for shooting panoramas and other tripod endeavors. I had a piece of 4" X 6" X 0.5" aluminum extrusion that I used for this. The hollow recesses on the bottom and side allow the safety pin on my ball head to work. I also added a hole and a rare earth magnet to hold the hex wrench. I always have a PD Arca plate on the bottom of my cameras, so I added a Desmond Arca clamp to it. I am also planning another version of this that will be even more useful.

M1025316-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

M1025322-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

M1025328-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr

M1025331-1 by Harvey Richards, on Flickr