This spring, Novoflex decided to radically expand its presence on the Russian market. For our review, we chose two of the most interesting and promising panoramic solutions on the market: the VR-System PRO II system and the VR-System SLANT system.

The main and fundamental difference between a panoramic head is the ability to use it to rotate and tilt the camera around the nodal point of the lens. The nodal point of a lens is the point at which all rays of light converge before diverging further. As a rule, the position of the aperture in the lens most closely corresponds to the nodal point. By moving the camera around it when shooting a panorama, we eliminate the possibility of parallax distortion.

To shoot a circular panorama, it is enough to take one row of vertical or horizontal frames.

To shoot a large and spherical (3D panorama) one row of frames is no longer enough. Such panoramas are called multi-row or mosaic. To shoot such a panorama, the panoramic head must be able to tilt the camera up and down. When shooting in this way, the nodal point should be located not only on the axis of the central column of the tripod, but also coincide with the level of the camera's tilt axis. We will tell you more about practical shooting of panoramas in future articles.

A little history

The Novoflex company begins its history in post-war Germany. In 1948, photographer Karl Müller founded the company, and already in 1950 he registered the “Novoflex” trademark. In the sixties, the company successfully developed and produced special bellows for cameras such as Contax and Hasselblad. Apparently, working with such famous brands allowed Novoflex to raise the quality bar to a level unattainable for many companies. In 2006, Novoflex creates its first panoramic system and in 2008 complements it with the QuadroPod system.

First meeting

The PRO II system is the most advanced panoramic system in the Novoflex line, capable of helping the photographer shoot any panoramas, with almost any optics (up to 300 mm) and any camera. PRO II is primarily designed for professionals and wealthy fans of panoramic photography.

The SLANT system is a special head for quickly creating spherical or 3D panoramas. Moreover, the speed of operation is the strongest aspect of this system. To create a 3D panorama, just take four frames using a fish-eye lens. As you can see, the camera is fixed at an angle of 60 degrees, which significantly optimizes the size of the structure and makes it possible to use a monopod when shooting.

For the test, we provided both sets to a professional photographer, President of the Guild of Advertising Photographers Dmitry Mukhin. Dmitry often has to shoot panoramic industrial landscapes and interiors.

Professional opinion

I have sufficient experience in shooting panoramas of interiors, landscapes and industrial photography. In my work I have been using the Manfrotto panoramic system for several years. I will compare the Novoflex system with it. The first thing that immediately catches your eye is the technical performance of this device, every detail of which is made with precision quality. If someone says that this is not the most important thing, I beg to differ with him. The level and class of equipment used in the work is very important for a professional. Very often, the level of equipment used can be used to judge the qualifications and cost of the services of a professional photographer. And one more important detail: you need to be 100% confident in panoramic equipment, since it is possible to check the result only after shooting, when it is almost impossible to go back and repeat the shot.

Constructive

When disassembled, the PRO II system is quite compact and not too heavy (1.69 kg), which allows a professional photographer to include it in a mandatory on-site equipment kit. Often, when preparing for on-site photography, the issue of the size and weight of equipment is a tough one. Sometimes you have to refuse to take some components with you to the detriment of future quality simply because it is difficult to convey.

During the test, the panoramic system was additionally equipped with a compact Novoflex MagicBalance ball assembly, which could not but please. Regardless of what surface the tripod is installed on: flat, uneven, or maybe even at an angle. The rotating assembly itself is easy to level. With Manfrotto, when setting the level when the clamp is finally clamped, the adjustment often gets lost; with Novoflex this does not happen. The dividing head in PRO II has the ability to automatically measure angles on the horizontal plane at 10, 15, 20, 24, 30, 36, 45 and 60 degrees. Switching between angles is very easy, you just need to turn the control wheel to a different position. And this is another design difference from Manfrotto.

For comparison, here’s what two professional panoramic systems look like: Novoflex and Manfrotto.

I've been using the Manfrotto system for over five years now and it has never let me down. PRO II looks more compact and less brutal against its background, let's see how it performs in operation. The SLANT system is an amazing thing. Using it, the camera is installed at an angle of 60 degrees, so that the diagonal of the frame becomes perpendicular to the scene being filmed. This is very convenient when shooting spherical circular panoramas with a fisheye lens, the distance of the camera lens axis becomes shorter, the console is smaller, and it is much easier to control the structure at the time of shooting.

Tests

To test both panoramic systems in the field, I decided to conduct three surveys in different conditions. The first is the open-air “Arkhangelskoye Estate Museum”, the second is a large room “Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology”, and a very small intimate room is the “Valentin Ryabov Gallery”.

Photography at the “Arkhangelskoye Estate Museum”

Of course, taking panoramas in Arkhangelskoe in winter is not a rewarding task; the entire famous park is under snow, and the sculptures are packed in wooden boxes. But my goal was to test Novoflex in our cold winter. But with this everything is in order, the weather outside is sunny and minus 18 degrees. I decided to shoot a line panorama of the façade of the “Great Palace” in order to create a large file size suitable for large format printing, and a circular panorama of the palace courtyard to check the accuracy of the entire system during further assembly. The dividing head, smoothly moving between shooting angles, at the same time recorded them very clearly, thereby eliminating frame skips. Those who shot panoramas will understand me - you start to collect a picture, but one frame from the panorama is missing, you just missed it and didn’t notice. Of course, this is the photographer's mistake, but with the PRO II you have to try really hard to miss a shot.

The unique four-legged QuadroPod tripod I took for testing also received a good test for frost resistance. I’ll explain why: the QuadroPod in our case was equipped with carbon legs (there are other configurations), and we were strongly advised not to work with it in the cold, they say the thing is expensive and can crack. But nothing terrible happened; the entire system worked at low temperatures without complaints or breakdowns.

The VR-System PRO II panoramic system comes with a licensed copy of the professional program Panoramastudio 2 pro. This program allows you to stitch together cylindrical and spherical panoramas. And since I didn’t make any serious mistakes while shooting, it only took a few minutes to select the necessary parameters for creating and exporting the panorama, and the program did the rest automatically.

Examples of captured and collected panoramas:

Photography at the Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology

Here it was decided to test the Slant system. To prepare the system for work, I remove one leg from the QuadroPod tripod, thereby obtaining a monopod, and attach the Slant to it. Next, I attach the camera and in a minute I’m ready to shoot. I will briefly describe what optics the manufacturer recommends using the Slant system with:

For cameras with crop sensor:

• Sigma 4.5mm/2.8 EX DC Fisheye HSM
• Sigma 8mm/3.5 EX DG Fisheye
• Peleng 8mm/3.5 Fisheye

For cameras with full frame sensor:

• Tokina AT-X 10-17mm / 3.5-4.5 DX Fisheye
• Sigma 10mm/2.8 EX DC Fisheye HSM
• Nikkor AF 10.5mm/2.8G ED DX Fisheye
• Samyang 8mm/3.5 Fisheye
• Canon EF 8-15mm/4 L USM Fisheye

To create a spherical panorama, you need to shoot only 4 frames, approximately at 90-degree intervals. The entire panorama shooting takes about a minute, and only because it takes some time to level the camera. If this is not your first time doing this, I think you can do it in 30 seconds.

I recommend collecting the footage in the PTgui program. This is the most complete and widespread program for assembling panoramas. I will also note that PTgui is an intuitive program, and you can figure it out without tedious reading of the manual.

Photography in “Valentin Ryabov Gallery”

In the gallery, I decided to shoot a spherical panorama, but with the PRO II system. It was necessary to achieve such image quality that the viewer would have the opportunity to examine and evaluate each painting in the interior. To do this, I used a panoramic head to capture 60 images, which I then compiled into a high-quality interactive panorama. I also shot several multi-row 180-degree panoramas, suitable for high-quality printing.

I collected all these panoramas in the PanoramaStudio 2 Pro program, which collected them quite quickly and automatically.

QuadroPod

I also want to dwell in a little more detail on an amazing product - the four-legged QuadroPod tripod. At first glance it’s complete madness, but you understand that the Germans are only mad when it comes to porn. It is not so easy to install, since you have to install three legs and adjust the fourth one under the surface. So what is it for?

In fact, a four-legged tripod is necessary just for shooting panoramas. The fact is that four points of support provide the same stability as a conventional tripod with a smaller leg radius than a conventional tripod. And accordingly, if the legs are not widely spaced, they do not fall into the camera’s field of view when shooting a spherical panorama.

The illustration below clearly shows this:

In addition, the quadropod has removable legs, each of which can be used as a monopod, and in the Variabel configuration, the QuadroPod left without a leg easily turns into a familiar tripod.

Estimated retail prices in Russia: VR-System PRO II – 31,200 rubles. VR-System SLANT – 10,300 rubles.

To create cartoons with your own hands (for example,), you need a tripod for shooting sheets of paper located on the table. A regular tripod is not suitable for this, because... The camera should be parallel to the table top on which the drawing is located. In addition, children constantly grab the tripod while working, and it moves, which is unacceptable in such cases.
There are special tripods and regular ones with this capability, but the price tag is beyond the circle’s budget. For example. Manfrotto 190XPROB costs from $200 there and weighs about 2 kg, which is quite a lot considering that the studio is mobile. For the same reason, it is not possible to use the base from an old photographic enlarger.
The idea arose to make a tripod that would be attached to the table yourself. The idea is not new and is implemented quite simply: two pipes connected by the letter L, a clamp is attached to one side, and a camera to the other.
You can see how to make a clamp yourself.
There is a problem how to attach the camera to the pipe. As you know, to mount a camera, an inch 1/4" thread is used. Such dies for cutting threads are usually not common, since most of us use metric threads. Of course, you can try to order such a screw from a turner, but if you don’t have a friend turner who will do this work during a conversation with you “for life”, then a “stranger” may ask for a considerable amount for a “non-standard” product.
An option is to use a ball head. This kind of thing can be found on old Soviet mini tripods, like this:

Additional Information

But in our small town there is no flea market, and shipping across the country increases the cost by more than one and a half times. In addition, people ask for such a tripod as if it were a rarity, although many probably have it lying around somewhere in their closet.
As a result of the search, a visible head was found on Ali. Unfortunately, after the introduction of new shipping rules from Ali, the purchase of inexpensive products becomes unjustified, but this item was purchased before...
Unfortunately, I didn’t take photos before installing the head, so I honestly stole the photo from the seller’s page. They fully correspond to the product. One shows the dimensions of the product.

Additional Information

Additional Information

Additional Information

The head is made entirely of metal (some kind of aluminum alloy), quite heavy (45 G), rotates 360 degrees horizontally and 100 degrees vertically. On the back there is a thread for the same 1/4". A screw on the side securely fastens the rod in any position. According to the seller's characteristics, this thing should withstand a camera up to 2.5 kg, but it feels like it will hardly be able to hold a DSLR, especially with a large lens. It fixes the point-and-shoot camera remarkably well.
Now about making a tripod.
A 25 mm furniture pipe and corresponding fastening were purchased.

Additional Information

The entire tripod, including the manufacture of the clamp, was assembled in about half a day at a neighbor’s garage, accompanied by the same conversations about “life” and a glass of tea.

Additional Information

At first I didn’t know how I would attach the head to the pipe. As I already said, the same non-standard 1/4 thread is cut at the bottom. By the way, I was not able to disassemble the head, I still did not understand how it was made. But it turned out that the diameter of the base is slightly larger than the internal diameter of the pipe 24.5 mm versus 22 mm. I just made slits in the pipe and practically hammered the head in. It turned out very firmly, although to be sure I drilled a hole in the side and screwed in a screw from the computer case.

Additional Information

The result is a lightweight, but reliable and inexpensive tripod. The total cost of the product is about $4.2.

Creating panoramas is quite a difficult and painstaking task, but the result of painstaking actions will delight both you, the creator, and the users. Creating panoramas is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. I have come across users saying the following: “To create panoramas, you just need to photograph several frames with overlap, and then align the frames in a special program, stitch them together and get a finished panorama.” We can say that this statement is true. but only for the beginning photographer. The result obtained may be satisfactory. But, if a photographer wants to develop professionally, then he needs to be critical of his previous works. Look at them as the first basic building block. The basis of future mastery in creating seamless panoramas.

Why is the statement about “aligning and stitching images into a panorama” not entirely correct? The answer is simple: the statement does not take into account what needs to be corrected and taken into account: distortions introduced by the lens, perspective and spatial distortion, color correction and many other factors.
In order to ensure less work on post, it is recommended to initially shoot the panorama as “correctly” as possible. And for this you cannot do without auxiliary means. Panoramic tripod head- this is one of the important devices that will allow you to create high-quality panoramas with less effort in post-processing. You can read more about why you need to use a panoramic head in a very good article.
I would like to consider the choice of a panoramic tripod head: buy a ready-made solution or make it yourself.

Ready solution

There are several solutions on the market. The most popular are .

Excellent panoramic head. Durable aluminum construction, guaranteed reliability from a renowned manufacturer, precise fixation. It is supported by the fact that the Hermitage panoramas were made by photographer Natalia Kovarskaya using this particular head. A detailed description of this head can be found in this article.
But the price cools the ardor a little: about 20,000 rubles. in the Russian Federation.

The head is from a Chinese manufacturer, the quality is satisfactory, but the price is about 14,000 rubles.

High quality head, easy to use.
But the price is about $640.

Allows you to use a heavy camera and lenses, lightweight, easy to handle. Precise positioning.
Price - about $450 for the top version.

Homemade heads

If you are a beginner photographer, you can try making a panoramic head yourself.
On the Internet you can find several solutions with drawings and/or detailed descriptions.

Homemade head, not inferior to commercial analogues. Detailed diagram and description on the page on his blog.

Head from Yuri Nadezhin

A solution from our compatriot, with a detailed description of the creation and drawings on his website.

You could say it’s a professional solution, the manufacture of which requires a metalworking machine. Drawings can be found or.

Homemade head priced at 200-300 rubles. Andrey even patented this invention. Withstands heavy photographic equipment. More details on Andrey’s personal page.

conclusions

The purpose of this article was to give the beginner or professional photographer an idea of ​​the panoramic heads that exist on the market or can be made by hand. It all depends on the photographer himself. If he has money and does not want to do anything, then he can choose a ready-made solution. If you don’t have money or want to make something of your own, then there are options for creating a head with your own hands.
P.S. I tried to show only the most popular solutions, but of course, I could have missed something. I will be glad to see amendments and additions. I hope the article will be useful to photographers who want to touch the magical world of panoramic photography.

P.s. Thanks everyone for finding the mistakes

This spring, Novoflex decided to radically expand its presence in the Russian market. For our review, we chose two of the most interesting and promising panoramic solutions on our market, the VR-System PRO II system and the VR-System SLANT system.

The main and fundamental difference between a panoramic head is the ability to use it to rotate and tilt the camera around the nodal point of the lens. The nodal point of a lens is the point at which all rays of light converge before diverging further. As a rule, the position of the aperture in the lens most closely corresponds to the nodal point; by moving the camera around it when shooting a panorama, we eliminate the possibility of parallax distortion.

To shoot a circular panorama, it is enough to take one row of vertical or horizontal frames.

To shoot a large and spherical (3D panorama) one row of frames is no longer enough. Such panoramas are called multi-row or mosaic. To shoot such a panorama, the panoramic head must be able to tilt the camera up and down. When shooting in this way, the nodal point should be located not only on the axis of the central column of the tripod, but also coincide with the level of the camera's tilt axis. We will tell you more about practical shooting of panoramas in future articles.

A little history

The Novoflex company begins its history in post-war Germany. In 1948, photographer Karl Müller founded the company and already in 1950 he registered the “Novoflex” trademark. In the sixties, the company successfully developed and produced special bellows for cameras such as Contax and Hasselblad. Apparently, working with such famous brands allowed Novoflex to raise the quality bar to a level unattainable for many companies. In 2006, Novoflex creates its first panoramic system and in 2008 complements it with the QuadroPod system.

First meeting

PRO II system is the most advanced panoramic system in the Novoflex line, capable of helping a photographer shoot any panoramas, with almost any optics (up to 300 mm) and any camera. PRO II is primarily designed for professionals and wealthy fans of panoramic photography.

SLANT system is a special head for quickly creating spherical or 3D panoramas. Moreover, the speed of operation is the strongest aspect of this system. To create a 3D panorama, just take four frames using a fish-eye lens. As you can see, the camera is fixed at an angle of 60 degrees, which significantly optimizes the size of the structure and makes it possible to use a monopod when shooting.

For the test, we provided both sets to a professional photographer, President of the Guild of Advertising Photographers Dmitry Mukhin. Dmitry often has to shoot panoramic industrial landscapes and interiors.

Professional opinion

I have sufficient experience in shooting panoramas of interiors, landscapes and industrial photography. In my work I have been using the Manfrotto panoramic system for several years. I will compare the Novoflex system with it. The first thing that immediately catches your eye is the technical performance of this device, every detail of which is made with precision quality. If someone says that this is not the most important thing, I beg to differ with him. The level and class of equipment used in the work is very important for a professional. Very often, the level of equipment used can be used to judge the qualifications and cost of the services of a professional photographer. And one more important detail, you need to be 100% confident in panoramic equipment, since it is possible to check the result only after shooting, when it is almost impossible to go back and repeat the shot.

Constructive

When disassembled, the PRO II system is quite compact and not too heavy (1.69 kg). This allows a professional photographer to include it in his mandatory on-site equipment set.

Often, when preparing for on-site photography, the issue of the size and weight of equipment is a tough one. Sometimes you have to refuse to take some components with you to the detriment of future quality simply because it is difficult to convey.

During the test, the panoramic system was additionally equipped with a compact “MagicBalance” ball unit, which could not but please. Regardless of what surface the tripod is installed on, flat, uneven, or maybe even at an angle, the rotating assembly itself is easy to level. With Manfrotto, when setting the level, when the clamp is finally clamped, the adjustment often gets lost; this does not happen with Novoflex. The dividing head in PRO II has the ability to automatically measure angles on the horizontal plane at 10,15,20,24,30,36,45 and 60 degrees. Switching between angles is very easy, you just need to turn the control wheel to a different position, and this is another design difference from Manfrotto.

For comparison, here is what two professional panoramic systems Novoflex and Manfrotto look like.

I have been working with the Manfrotto system for more than five years and it has never let me down, PRO II looks more compact and less brutal compared to it, let’s see how it shows itself in operation.

SLANT system amazing thing. Using it, the camera is installed at an angle of 60 degrees, so that the diagonal of the frame becomes perpendicular to the scene being filmed. This is very convenient when shooting spherical circular panoramas with a fisheye lens, the distance of the camera lens axis becomes shorter, the console is smaller and it is much easier to control the structure at the time of shooting.

Tests

To test both panoramic systems in the field, I decided to conduct three surveys in different conditions. The first is a plein air “Arkhangelskoye Estate Museum”, the second is a large room “Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology” and a very small intimate room is “Valentin Ryabov Gallery”.

Photography at the Arkhangelskoye Estate Museum

Of course, taking panoramas in Arkhangelsk in winter is not a rewarding task, the entire famous park is under snow, and the sculptures are packed in wooden boxes, but I set out to test Novoflex in our cold winter. But with this everything is in order, the weather outside is sunny and minus 18 degrees.

I decided to shoot a row panorama of the façade of the “Grand Palace” in order to create a large file suitable for large-format printing and a circular panorama of the palace courtyard to check the accuracy of the entire system during further assembly. The dividing head smoothly moved between shooting angles and at the same time recorded them very clearly, thereby eliminating frame skips. Those who shot panoramas will understand me - you start to collect a picture and one frame from the panorama is missing, you just missed it and didn’t notice. Of course, this is the photographer's mistake, but with PRO II you have to try very hard to miss the frame.

The unique four-legged QuadroPod tripod I took for testing also received a good test for frost resistance. I’ll explain why, the QuadroPod in our case was equipped with carbon legs (there are other configurations), and we were strongly advised not to work with it in the cold, they say the thing is expensive and can crack. But nothing terrible happened; the entire system worked at low temperatures without complaints or breakdowns.

The VR-System PRO II panoramic system comes with a licensed copy of the professional program Panoramastudio 2 pro. This program allows you to stitch together cylindrical and spherical panoramas. And since I didn’t make any serious mistakes while shooting, it only took a few minutes to select the necessary parameters for creating and exporting the panorama, and the program did the rest automatically.

Panorama size 12000x6000 pixels (download)

Circular panorama

Photography at the Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology

Here it was decided to test the Slant system. To prepare the system for work, I remove one leg from the QuadroPod tripod, thereby obtaining a monopod and attach the Slant to it. Next, I attach the camera and in a minute I’m ready to shoot.

I will briefly describe which optics the manufacturer recommends using the Slant system with:

For cameras with crop sensor:

• Sigma 4.5mm/2.8 EX DC Fisheye HSM
• Sigma 8mm/3.5 EX DG Fisheye
• Peleng 8mm/3.5 Fisheye

For cameras with full frame sensor:

• Tokina AT-X 10-17mm / 3.5-4.5 DX Fisheye
• Sigma 10mm/2.8 EX DC Fisheye HSM
• Nikkor AF 10.5mm/2.8G ED DX Fisheye
• Samyang 8mm/3.5 Fisheye
• Canon EF 8-15mm/4 L USM Fisheye

To create a spherical panorama, you need to shoot only 4 frames, approximately at 90-degree intervals. The entire panorama shooting takes about a minute, and only because it takes some time to level the camera. If this is not your first time doing this, I think you can do it in 30 seconds.

Shooting 4 frames in the museum.

I recommend collecting the footage in the PTgui program - this is the most complete and widespread program for assembling panoramas. I will also note that PTgui is an intuitive program and you can figure it out without tedious reading of the manual.

An example of a captured and collected panorama:

Panorama of the Vadim Zadorozhny Museum of Technology.

Photography at the Valentin Ryabov Gallery

In the gallery, I decided to shoot a spherical panorama but with the PRO II system. It was necessary to achieve such image quality that the viewer would have the opportunity to examine and evaluate each painting in the interior. To do this, I used a panoramic head to capture 60 images, which I then compiled into a high-quality interactive panorama. I also shot several multi-row 180-degree panoramas, suitable for high-quality printing.

I collected all these panoramas in the PanoramaStudio 2 Pro program, which collected them quite quickly and automatically.

Examples of captured and collected panoramas:

Panorama in the Valentin Ryabov Gallery.

Gallery Valentin Ryabov

Backstage

QuadroPod

I also want to dwell in a little more detail on an amazing product - the four-legged QuadroPod tripod. At first glance it’s complete madness, but you understand that the Germans are only mad when it comes to porn. It is not so easy to install, since you have to install three legs and adjust the fourth one under the surface.

So what is it for?

In fact, a four-legged tripod is necessary just for shooting panoramas. The fact is that four points of support provide the same stability as a regular tripod with a smaller leg radius than a regular tripod. And accordingly, if the legs are not widely spaced, they do not fall into the camera’s field of view when shooting a spherical panorama.

The illustration below clearly shows this

In addition, the quadropod has removable legs, each of which can be used as a monopod, and in the Variabel configuration, the QuadroPod left without a leg easily turns into a familiar tripod.

Estimated retail prices in Russia: VR-System PRO II - 31,200 rubles. VR-System SLANT - 10,300 rubles.

If you already have some practice shooting panoramic images, you know that the standard set of necessary equipment consists of a camera, a sturdy tripod and a special panoramic head. Of course, some craftsmen manage to shoot a panorama with a regular head, and sometimes even without a tripod, but sooner or later, with the growth of skills and mastery, the photographer will still face the need to have a panoramic head in his arsenal, especially since its use significantly reduces the occurrence of artifacts, and therefore time spent on further computer processing of panoramic photographs.

Basically, artifacts arise for two reasons - due to the movement of objects during shooting (in which they fall into the frame overlap zone) and due to the rotation of the camera around a point other than the nodal one. Let us recall that the nodal point is a point located at a certain distance inside the lens, at which the rays that form the image intersect. Conventional tripod heads allow you to rotate the camera around its center of rotation, usually located in the area of ​​the tripod socket when rotating horizontally, or 5-10 cm below the camera when rotating vertically. The nodal point is located in the center of the lens, approximately at its beginning.

Having previously studied many options for homemade heads, I designed my “product”, which consists of four main parts - an X-Y bracket, a Z bracket, a platform for the camera and a platform for the tripod.

I’ll start characterizing my head from the bottom. The platform for the tripod is presented in two parts - a quick-release platform from a Culmann tripod and a cut metal profile 20x40. In our case, the piece had a length of 48 mm, but 40 mm would have been enough. Both parts are fastened with an M6 screw, the purpose of which is to prevent rotation of both parts relative to each other. At the same time, if the platform were a little stronger, and if the protrusion on the tripod near the platform did not interfere, then there would be no need to use a piece of metal profile.

Our next “spare part” is the X-Y bracket. It was made from a 25x3 metal strip, with an X distance from the center of rotation of 57 mm (350D mount center 35 mm from the bottom of the camera + 3 mm platform + 1 mm platform pad + Z3 mm bracket + 13.25 mm shims + 1.75 mm). As a result, the total length of X reaches 57+15=72 mm.

In principle, the length X from the axis of rotation to the outer edge can be made larger, but I don’t see much point in this, since the center of gravity of the structure is shifted to the opposite side and it will not be possible to focus in this direction.

But on the contrary, I made the Y axis the longest. The length was determined in such a way that it was possible to shoot the “lid”, that is, a frame at +90°. At the same time, from the rotation axis Y to X there is enough space for the bracket with the camera mounted on it. Moreover, with such a length of the bracket, if you accidentally let go of the device (for example, when you loosen a screw along the Y axis), it will not hit X. In total, the distance from the rotation axis Z on Y to X for me was 175 mm, and the total length was 185 mm. Since Z turns out to be less than Y, the head folds quite compactly.

To make X-Y, I used a strip of metal with a total length of 185 + 72 = 247 mm, which was bent in a vice, then slightly adjusted with a hammer and bent with a gas wrench. After the above-described manipulations, I ended up with a thing that is not ideal in appearance, but geometrically correct along its axes. All that remains is to drill two 6mm holes for the axles.

The length of Z was not chosen by chance, but after a series of preliminary fittings, when a consensus was finally reached at 142 mm, while from the center of rotation to the axis of the platform - 58-116 mm. This gave me an adjustment range of 58 mm. This Z geometry is suitable for all lenses at my disposal, and the Z can be shortened down to 136 mm. Bracket Z is separated from XY by adjusting washers (in my case, a nut and washer).

This was done so that during shooting +90°, the bolt fixing the camera platform did not touch the Y. In addition, by removing the washer or slightly reducing its thickness, it becomes possible to install a camera with a higher optical center, although in this case you will lose the opportunity shooting +90°. The axis is a bolt with a diameter of 6 mm, which, if possible, should be welded to the Z bracket. I drilled it from the side and secured it with an additional M3 screw.

And finally, the last part of the head is the platform for the camera. Due to the fact that the 350d's tripod socket is located on the axis of the lens, making the platform was not difficult. The platform was made from a strip of metal 35x72 mm, in which I drilled two holes - 6.5 mm in diameter for a tripod socket, and for a pin that prevents the camera from rotating on the platform.

Due to the fact that I did not want to spend time calculating the position of the pin and tripod socket, I simply took a scan of the device using a flatbed scanner and then, in Photoshop, drew the platform, marking the axes. Having printed the resulting diagram on a printer, I pasted it onto my workpiece and drilled it through the paper.

According to the original plan, the pin was supposed to be made from an M3 screw screwed into the platform, but since I had some problems with the drill (I used an electric screwdriver instead), the screw had to be cold welded, but due to the fact that the hole is at the bottom of the camera has a diameter of less than 3 mm, the screw was processed with a file. After that, I screwed the platform to the Z axis, and cold welded the spoke guides to its sides. As a result, the platform could only move along its axis, and without turning. And in order for the camera to sit “softer” on the platform, a piece of dermantine was previously glued onto it.

A few words about limbs. I found dials graduated by 5 degrees to be inconvenient, so I decided to make dials with dots, with each dot corresponding to one frame. Since I want to shoot panoramas with a standard 29mm lens (18x1.6), I need to plan for shooting 10 horizontal frames in one row. Therefore, the points on the limb should be located at 36 degrees. But this solution did not turn out to be convenient enough - for more accurate positioning you need an arrow. As a result, I managed to come up with a more original version of the limb. On it I marked lines at 36 degrees, indicating the near side of the bracket.

I just set the bracket parallel to the line, take a shot, rotate the bracket again, etc. The limb for vertical slopes is made in a similar way. There, the dial is fixed to the Z axis, and the Y axis serves as an arrow. If lenses are changed during filming, you can draw lines of different colors, or make interchangeable dials. In my case, the limbs were drawn in Photoshop and designed to use brackets with a width of 24 mm. The printed and cut out limbs were placed between a plastic lid and the bottom of a can of ear sticks.

And finally the last nuance - nuts with collars. In order to rotate the X-Y axes, you don’t have to look for a particularly powerful nut; an ordinary wing will be quite enough. But to secure the Z axis you will need a nut with a thicker knob. I went through many options and settled on a nut from some part, with a metal plate screwed on. The force applied during the screwing process was sufficient to prevent the bracket with the camera from slipping. That's basically it!

All we have to do is collect all the above details into one whole and go for a panoramic photo shoot. In total, I spent 3-4 hours making a working sample, without dials and imperfections; several more evenings were spent experimenting with washers and dials, as well as other little things. But if you have the tools and materials, all this can be done in half a day.

And finally, let's calculate the financial costs. A strip of metal 24x3 and a piece of profile 20x40 cost me only 10 rubles on the construction market. I also bought washers there, at a price of about 1 ruble/piece, bolts for 5 rubles/piece. The 1/4' bolt was borrowed from an old Ewa Marina box, the dials were printed on Epson SemiGlossy paper (with ink for 2 dials - about 10 rubles). The quick-release platform came from a Culmann tripod; the rest of the little things were found in our own bins. As a result, 10+1×3+2×5+0+10+0 = 33 rubles. That is, we got a panoramic head with horizontal-vertical rotation and settings for various lenses for only 33 rubles!