Comments on: DIY Camera Controller – The Program – Part 6

By: Rick N

Rick N — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:59:12 +0000

Hi
Iam new to all this emailing (as a siver suffer) but love Photgraphy and came agross your site Lovvvvvvvvvve IT, Iam starting to Collecting all the parts and if it ago to plan it will be great . But reading the comments I should be ok and the instruction are very will written.

I have also been looking for the one on the veroboard with Arduino pro mini so you can put it all in a project case, but no luck in finding the website or have I missed it.

if someone gets this ! Can anyone let me know

By: Bambi

Bambi — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 20:18:04 +0000

Google knows all…..
Just go’s to show that you shouldn’t be daunted by this project, if you can solder two wires together, you can do it. It does look very scary when you first start it, what with programming, lcd displays, compiling and uploading. At the end of the day its just following instructions and clicking a mouse. You will also learn so much in doing it yourself.

One thing I keep forgetting to mention is, if you are doing water drops and want to use a sensor to to detect the drops, use one of Louise’s laser trip wires. I had way more luck than with a IR photo-gate. Just point the laser direct at the detector rather than bouncing it. (Check e-bay regularly for laser modules, I paid £3.99 for two inc postage)

By: Louise

Louise — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 20:59:16 +0000

Excuse me, but was it not you who was unsure if you could do anything with the code when you first contacted me?

It would seem you have been bitten by the arduino bug LOL You have to admit they really are quite amazing little gadgets

Have you seen the price of the commercial controller capable of timed drops and collisions – I think the time invested in finding your way around the arduino is a much better investment

By: Bambi

Bambi — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 20:37:26 +0000

I have been tweaking again, and have yet another re-write of the script purely for water drops.
Added individual settings for each drop from the solenoid for size and delay before the next drop, which can be incremented with every frame. An automatic mode for taking long sequences of shots. There is no need to use a sensor with this re-hash of the code, although I do want to put it all back together again with your original script. I have added a mirror lockup feature for canon cameras, which now works as it should. Finally I have added DropExif the script will now send the settings for each frame taken via the COM port, and with the help of a great little program, Gobetwino, save this data to a .csv file to be imported into excel. You should be able to match up nice looking shots to settings now, without having to write them all down on post-it notes. Louise, you really unleashed the inner geek in me with this project.

P.S I now have close to 2000 drop shots on my pc and most of them are collisions, so your kit definitely works.

By: Louise

Louise — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 01:49:16 +0000

Check out what Bambi has done with the controller http://bambi.ws/

He has modified the program to allow control of a solenoid valve and create timed drops for collision shots as well as a few other refinements, there are some absolutely superb examples on his website

By: mark

mark — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 01:41:24 +0000

great project. I am just getting started with arduino, and have been photographing for years. Hope you get time to work on part 6 and more.

By: Louise

Louise — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 19:22:20 +0000

Fantastic Bambi!

I am so pleased you got it working, and the results are pretty awesome already, I can’t wait to see the results when you start working on composition etc.

You have done a superb job updating the code and I am sure there will be plenty of people who will appreciate everything you have done

By: Bambi

Bambi — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 18:39:55 +0000

Its finished, and what’s more it works!
I got a collision shot on my 2nd photograph, and 2 more very similar ones with the next two shots taken. I have only had about half an hour to play with this with my full setup, but I have managed to shoot a little sequence of shots to make a very simple animation on a water drop collision.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bambi72/5252290531/

My edited version of your script is now up on my website, although I have added a new ‘drain water reservoir’ option to help reduce the mess in the kitchen, this version isn’t uploaded yet but will be soon.

By: Louise

Louise — Sat, 30 Oct 2010 20:57:38 +0000

It would not take a huge amount of work to add in a double trigger – I assume that is what you are referring to in order to create collision drops.

There is two timers running as it is so you could modify one of those to a double trigger without much effort

By the way, SUPERB website, and some truly spectacular photographs!

By: Bambi

Bambi — Sat, 30 Oct 2010 20:24:14 +0000

The internet is a wonderful thing…
I have been looking for someone to share how to build something just like this. I have just ordered myself one of the kits supplied by hi-viz, but I can see myself upgrading to your design. I am guessing it would be possible to add some code to also control a solenoid to do timed water drops for some perfect collision shots

Thanks for taking the time to post these excellent articles, I will let you know when I have built my own