Arduino Time-Lapse Dolly Project Part 1

Let me preface this article by saying I am NOT an expert in electronics, or programming or the Arduino... I am pretty confident that I can hack something together, and perhaps my readers can help me along the way if I get stuck.

First I will briefly describe what I have in mind.  I have been taking a lot of Milky Way time-lapse movies recently and to add a little pizzazz to them I would like to have the camera move on a track.  So I can either I can stay up all night and move the camera manually - which sounds like work.  Or I could automate it with some programmable computer thingy.  Option two sounds way better.  The thought is I would have the Arduino trigger the camera for the appropriate amount of time.  When the shutter closes, move the camera on the track a short distance.  Then trigger the camera again and repeat until the sun comes up.  For those who are not aware of what is required to shoot Milky Way time lapse, it takes 300 individual pictures to make 10 seconds of video at 30 frames per second.  For each photo, the shutter is open for 30 seconds.  I prefer to try and shoot all night, which may be 8 hours worth of shooting and equals about 800 shots.  This is why I would like to automate it!  I would rather sleep all night than baby sit the camera. See my first video below:



Now, I am not very electronic savvy - most of my background is in car electronics so I am all about the relays and switches.  To me a transistor is something Harry Potter probably used.  I heard of something called a stepper motor which I think I need to move the camera dolly. After some research I know Arduinos have these shield things to control motors.

Step 1, buy and Arduino.  Check!  Actually I got the Mega because the shield I bought said it worked for the Mega but didn't explicitly say it worked for the Uno so I thought I would just get the Mega for now.

Step 2, buy a stepper motor shield. Check!  I got the SainSmart one off of Amazon.  Hopefully it does everything I need because I don't really know much about stepper motors and such.

The Arduino site suggests installing the "Blink" program.  Well when I plugged it in for the first time the LED was already blinking so that really doesn't help.  So what I did instead was take the standard blink program and change the blink interval.  Uploaded that and it worked great.

Here is the code I used:

int led = 13;

// the setup routine runs once when you press reset:
void setup() {              
  // initialize the digital pin as an output.
  pinMode(led, OUTPUT);  
}

// the loop routine runs over and over again forever:
void loop() {
  digitalWrite(led, HIGH);   // turn the LED on (HIGH is the voltage level)
  delay(250);               // wait for a second
  digitalWrite(led, LOW);    // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
  delay(300);
digitalWrite(led, HIGH);   // turn the LED on (HIGH is the voltage level)
  delay(250);
 digitalWrite(led, LOW);    // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
  delay(1000); // wait for a second
}


I bought a cheap shutter release cable and opened it up to see how it triggered the camera and figure out how to wire it into the Arduino.  I cut the wires to the board (see photo below) and tried connecting different ones together to figure out what combination fired the camera.  What worked was connecting all three together.  If I connected the red and white together nothing happened, but if I connected the white and black it was like a half shutter press, and connecting the red and black did nothing.

See the cut wires in the black connector on the main board. 

With my simplified electronics background the firth thing I thought of was a relay.  Tie the red and white wires together, and use the Arduino to actuate a relay to connect the red and white wires to the black wire. So I wired one up like this:

Hooked up on a bread board it looks like this:

Now one special note - the Arduino can only support 40mA through each pin so you have to pick relay that doesn't draw more than that.  The first relay I got drew 90mA and though it worked, I think it will fry the Arduino over time. How do you figure it out?  Take the voltage, divide it by the resistance.   If its less than .04 then you are OK.  Since the Arduino puts out 5 volts, you take 5 and divide it by the resistance of the coil in the relay (expressed in Ohms).  You need a relay that can be triggered by 5v and has a coil resitance of 125 ohms or more.

As for the code I took the Blink code and changed the pin to 10 and wired the relay up as shown above.  Plugged the Arduino into the computer and listened for the click.  Then I plugged the wires from the shutter release to the camera and did the same thing this time the camere should fire at a regular interval.

Sure enough, it did!  Great success!

Stay tuned for more updates!

Isle Royale Cont.

On day 4 it was time to hike back to Three Mile camp. I could have decided to just stay at Daisey Farm, but it seemed better to hike 7 miles on this day and only 3.4 Friday to catch the ferry instead of vice versa. However, the day was gorgeous; a warm bright sun fended off the chilly Lake Superior breeze. This was the first day during the whole trip that I wore a t-shirt. All my previous days I had been wearing several layers of light jackets, a sweater, long sleeve shirt and a short sleeve shirt. It may sound uncomfortable, but it was actually quite ideal. At any given time I could either shed or add layers to keep at a comfortable temperature.

Here are some pictures that took to try and campture the magic of the scenery. What I was not able to do was get a picture that accurately portrays the ancient, wizen, and heartiness of the trees, lichen, moss, and rocks. The island looks like something you would find in a magical kindgom of elves and gnomes. Many of the trees are covered in moss, the moss covers the ground and the rocks are painted with lichen.


Here is a picture of Three Mile camp... or the dock anyways since the camp is well hidden in the trees.


Sunset on my last night on the island:
Here is a night shot I took that same night:

I am hoping to make time next year to take this trip again. If I go a little later in the season, the berries will be in season and while hiking you can also graze.

If you have any questions feel free to ask. You can get my contact information here.

Please feel free to visit my web page.

Thanks,
Matthew Eddy
Photographer

Isle Royale Trip 5/25-5/29/2009 CONT...

Day 2:
Staying the night in the shelter was pretty chilly. The wind blew right into the shelter and made the night a little uncomfortable. At about midnight I wrapped the rain fly of the tent around me to help cut the wind. My sleeping bag is rated to 20 degrees F, I have a full sized inflatable sleeping pad, and I was wearing long johns and a light wool sweater.

I got up at around 8, cooked a hearty breakfast of oatmeal, packed up and was on the trail by 10 am or so. Off hand, I can't recall how long it took me to get to Moskey Basin, but I think I was there by about 1:30 or so. The hike from Three Mile to Daisy Farm was pretty easy. Daisey Farm to Moskey Basin was a bit tiring since the trail moves away from the coast and goes up into the hills a bit. It seemed that a lot of people had the same idea as myself to make Moskey Basin a final destination. Threre were only a few shelters and tent sites available. However, the design of the camp ground was such that I found a relatively secluded tent site. Given the night I had, I wanted a tent site, and it was a great decision. It sprinkled a little that night and but I was warm any cozy in my little tent.

I didn't do much after arriving in Moskey Basin since the weather was a little ugly, with some showers and high winds.


Day 3:
The weather didn't start getting good until Wednesday night just before sunset. I was hoping that it was clear a little earlier, and I decided to hike out to Lake LaSage. As I was hiking out, I ran into one small group who said that people reported fresh wolf tracks and scat. Out around Lake LaSage, I did see tracks and some fresh scat. Originally I was hoping to stay out there for a while and get some nice shots of the sunset over the lake, but I am happy that I decided to head back to Moskey Basin since I got to watch one of the best sunsets I have seen in a long time. Below are pictures of the sunset. It was amazing how the clouds changed, and

This was one of the LONGEST sunsets I have ever experienced. I think the sun technically set at around 9pm, but it wasn't until after 10 or closed to 11 that the sky started to get dark. The next night I was trying to take pictures of the stars and I had to wait until midnight before the light from the sun had dimmed enough to start to even SEE the stars. Also, as you can see by the pictures, the light, sky and colors changed dramatically over the course of the sunset.

Ill post more later.

Thanks,

Matthew Eddy

Photographer

http://www.oil-rigs.net/

Isle Royale Trip 5/25-5/29/2009

For those of you who are unaware of what Isle Royale National Park is or where it is located here is a brief description. The island is a wild life preserve whose remoteness and rugged wilderness make it a wondrous place for avid outdoors person. I was attracted by the isolation the possibility of seeing moose, and the hope that I would hear a wolf howl. The island is approximately 45 miles long, and 8.5 miles wide at its widest point. Because the island is some distance away from the main land, there are only 10 mammal species that reside on the island such as moose, wolf, and fox. There are NO bears or racoons.

For those of you in the know, and what some quick info on the conditions of the island here is my experience in a nut shell.

Moose: I didn't see any. Apparently this time of year is when the expecting mothers go off to secluded areas to give birth. Since the weather is still chilly, and the plants along Lake Superior haven't really bloomed, the male moose were foraging up on the rdige. So the 2 people who I met that did see moose, they saw them up on the ridge (2 of them), and at Feldtman Lake (6 moose).

Foxes: I didn't see any, and I didn't have any issues with them raiding my gear, though I was careful to keep my boots in my tent or shelter anyways.

Bugs: 2 mosquitoes and lots of flys my last 2 days when it warmed up a bunch.

Wolves: I didn't see any. Apparently one guy did see a wolf walk past his shelter. I didn't hear any, but I did see fresh tracks and fresh scat and tons of old dried scat.

Weather: Chilly and overcast the first 2.5 days, but bearable. The last 2.5 days the sun came out and it warmed up quite a bit. A little sprinkle of rain my second night, but that was it.

Crowds: The boat on the way out and back was pretty full, but then again, it is only running Monday and Friday, so about 40-60 people coming out for the week.

Day 1:
I have a quick plug for the North Port Motel. As I was preparing to leave for the ferry, when I locked my keys in my car, and even though I had all my backpacking gear out, I still had stuff that I needed to put in the car. Well, the people at the motel let me leave my car at the motel all week, and even had the sheriff unlock the car while I was away. It was so nice getting back and not having to worry about getting the car unlocked.

I left from Copper Harbor on the Isle Royale Queen IV. The ferry ride out was smooth, there were almost no swell or waves to speak of. Three hours after leaving, we were pulling into Rock Harbor. After disembarking, the rangers gathered everyone around and gave a little presentation on "Leave No Trace" camping, answered and few questions and then let groups register. When you register, you give them your estimated itinerary but if you deviate from the itinerary you gave them, you simply correct it when you turn it back into the ranger station when you check back in.

I was one of the last people to leave Rock Harbor to head to my first camp. Originally I was hoping to make it to Daisy Farm, but I met up with Eric and Taylor, two guys who I sat with on the ferry ride, and when we reached Three Mile Camp, and no one else was there, we decided to make camp. It was only 2 pm, but I was over burdened with camera gear, and the three miles of trail from Rock Harbor to Three Mile Camp is very rocky and tiresome. But since there was still a lot of daylight, I decided to hike up to Mount Franklin, which was approximately 2.5 miles each way. On the way up I saw a moose antler laying on the side of the trail and many small trees that had been racked by a bull moose's antlers. The view from the top was nice, but I didn't take any pictures since the day was overcast, but I could see Canada from the top.



Here is the moose antler that was laying on the side of the trail. It looks like its been there for some time, and it will probably be there for a few more years if no one trys to take it.



At Three Mile Camp, I had taken a shelter for the night, but in hindsight I would have preferred sleeping in my tent since the shelters are a bit colder, and the wind just blew right into the shelter. Probably, when its warmer and there are more bugs, the shelters may be preferable, but at this time, the tempertures during the day were probably in the mid 60's with a chilly wind off the water, and at night I am sure it dipped into the low 40's. So, in the shelter, that cold wind blew right in since the front of the shelters is just like a big screen door.


Again, not many pictures since the days were over cast and the lighting was crummy. It wasn't until the Wednesday and Thursday that I really started to take pictures since the sun came out.

Continued on next post...

Matthew Eddy
Photographer
www.oil-rigs.net

My Digital Pinhole Camera

I have never seriously pursued pinhole photography, but idea of it, and the soft dreamy scenes have always appealed to me. One day I got this wild idea to make a pinhole lens for my D300. So, without consulting the all mighty internet for ideas, I set about making this lens. Whatever the outcome, I wanted a lens that was professional looking, and not something like a cardboard tube with aluminum foil taped over the front or something like that. To me, this dictated that the lens had to mount to the camera on the Nikon F mount. The only items that I could think of that could mount to the body of the camera were a lens or extension tubes used for macro photography. If I wanted to use a lens, I would have to strip it of its glass, or remove the mount from the lens and somehow attach the pinhole to the mount. I looked at my small inventory of lenses, and though I had some real cheap lenses, they all worked, and I couldn't make myself disassemble one. That left me, in my mind, two options. Try and find a broken or very cheap lens (I was thinking $5-15 is my budget for this project) or find really cheap extension tubes. For some reason, I thought a set of extension tubes would run me $50+, so I didn't bother to look at what was available. Instead, I search craigslist, and ebay for broken lenses. No luck. On a whim, I search ebay for extension tubes and found a ton that were only $10 (that included shipping). So I bought a set. Of course it was coming all the way from China, and I didn't expedite the shipment so it took about 2 weeks to get the extension tube set in the mail. My expectations for this product was fairly low, and I pretty much expected them to be made out of plastic, but they are aluminum. Even still, I am very careful not to cross thread them or try and tighten the various extension tubes to much since I am sure the threads will just get torn apart.

With extension tubes in hand, how do I turn them into a pinhole lens? I am lucky and work for a medium to large machine shop and a friend of mine who is a machinist offered to make me something if I drew up a print. So, 2 minutes to draw something up for him, and a day for him to machine it for me I had a part that looked like a lens cap that as threaded and could be screwed onto the entension tubes. Below are some pictures.

Here is the extension tube set with the aluminum pinhole adapter.




For those not aware of how extension tubes work, the tubes are a set of 5 parts, first part has the nikon body mount on one side and threaded on the other. Three parts ar basically just spacers that thread onto the first part. The last part threads on the end and the lens mounts onto it. So the pinhole adapeter is threaded to screw onto any one of the spacers.

Here is another image with the extension tubes and adapter.


Here is a picture with the adapter screwed onto the end of the extension tube.



So now I need to make a pinhole in something. My first attempt was using aluminum foil like most pinhole cameras are made with. The results were less than desirable. At first I thought this project was all for not. I was not naive to think that I was the first one to come up with this hair brained idea, and given my poor results, I decided to look on the internet and see how other people's pinhole cameras turned out. I found one guy who punctured a hole in a can and seemed to have the image quality that I wanted mint to have.

Here is a sample image using the aluminum foil.


So I took a coke can and cut it up, sanded it on both sides and used a thumb tack to make a hole. The idea, when making the hole, was to make the smallest possible hole. So I tried to stick it in just enough to start penetrating the aluminum. Since the pressure of the pin dents the aluminum, I sanded the front and back one more time.

Here are some of the tools I used.


Here is a macro shot of the hole (using the extension tubes as intended!).


Now I need to affix this to my pinhole adapter. This image has a close up of the hole along to the top since its difficult to see.


Now for a picture of the whole rig on my N80 film camera.


Pretty sexy for a pinhole camera... well I think so anyways, but I am a bit of a photo geek.

So how does this new hole compare to the terrible picture above? Check it out!

Yeah, its soft, but much better than the other, in my opinion. I even refined the hole a bit, and made one a touch smaller and got an image that was a little better. These small images may make it difficult to see the difference but here is a comparison anyways.

When using the aluminum foil, my hypothesis is that the pin creates a ridge of displaced material on one side of the pinhole. This ridge interferes with the image quality, but when using an aluminum can, the ridge can be sanded away, and the image quality is much improved.

Now I need to take it into the field and really play around!

Until next time...

Matthew Eddy
Photographer
http://www.oil-rigs.net/

Updates...

What is new? I have been going to the Livingston County Photography club for the last few meetings. The group of people are pretty nice, and I like the mix of personalities.

A quick note: I am creating Photoshop tutorial videos on Youtube. So far I only have one video; an introduction to CS3, but I expect to make more over the next few months. These videos are basically for my students, but I hope that it will generate more traffic to my website and all that good stuff. Maybe Ill get people reading this blog - then I would have to write about interesting stuff. Maybe I should do a series of blog entries that teach a little about photography each week... that seems like a lot of work! Well, it might be fun since I would learn stuff myself trying to come up with interesting topics.

Go here to see my videos on youtube.

I will also be posting little tutorials on my web site that cover the same topics as the videos for those who prefer to read than to watch. Those tutorials, which take more time to make, and one is almost complete, will be available >>>HERE<<<.

Take care.

My new lens: Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8

WOW

What else is there to say? All the reviews say the same. For me, this lens on my D300 is perfect. I bought a Sigma 18-50mm, and I am happy with it, but since the D300 is a DX camera, there is a 1.5 magnification to the equivalent focal length of the lens - and I just couldn't get wide enough with 18mm. An 18mm lens on my D300, is like a 27mm lens on a film camera. However, a 14mm lens is like a 21mm lens on a film camera, and there is a huge difference between 21mm and 27mm! I really don't know waht else to say about this lens except that I want to take more pictures with it. Because of the overcast light, I didn't have problems with flare, but I happy with the contrast the lens managed on such a muddy day. I also noticed that I didn't have much perspective correction to make when at 20-24mm.

For now, I think my lens collection is pretty complete between the 14-24mm Nikkor, and the 18-50 f/2.8 Sigma, and a 70-210mm f4-5.6 lens since I don't do much work past 50mm mark anyway. The 24-70mm f/2.8 Nikkor lens looks pretty tempting since I would like to get a FX body at some point and the Sigma only works on the APS-C sensor bodies. Well, for now, I am pretty well set on lenses.

If you aren't sure what I am talking about when I refer to DX camera, and 1.5x magnification, feel free to email me and I would be more than happy to explain it to you.

Well here are a couple of shots I took early Saturday morning.




Just a little self promotion, but I am a local Ann Arbor MI photographer and my website can ber viewed here.

If you are interested in photography, and can't find any local classes, then check out this page of my website here. Since I teach a class through Ann Arbor's Rec and Ed department, I have put together a few powerpoint presentions on the fundamentals of photography and you can download the pdf versions.

Thanks,
Matt