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Blog Creating a cable Supported and Driven Camera with 3D Printing and a GoPro - Cablecam
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  • Author Author: amgalbu
  • Date Created: 22 Sep 2022 5:00 PM Date Created
  • Views 40761 views
  • Likes 12 likes
  • Comments 8 comments
  • worldinmotionch
  • cablecam
Related
Recommended

Creating a cable Supported and Driven Camera with 3D Printing and a GoPro - Cablecam

amgalbu
amgalbu
22 Sep 2022

For this project14, I thought to build a camera that travels along a cable and take videos using a GoPro

First version

The starting point is the TMC2300-IOT-REF board, that I will use to drive to motor that makes the camera move along the rope. I created a 3D-printed base to host all the components

image

Added a stepper motor

image

Then two pulley that will support the weight and stabilize the whole assembly as it moves along the rope

image

imageimage

I added a servo to make an action cam rotate while the Cablecam moves

image

imageimage

A battery holder has been glued on the back 

imageimage

Finally I added the TMC2300 board and connected all the components

image

Here is the final result

image


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Revised version

After the first tests, I unfortunately realized the stepper motor had not enough torque. So I replaced the stepper motor with a continuous-rotation servo and, since I need to print a new board, I added a couple of holes that will let me give the possibility to place the pulley above or below to row (if the latter is the case, the pulley will just stabilize the Cablecam, since all the weight will be supported by the servo shaft)

image   image

With these changes, I was able to make my first movie

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To control Cablecam, I create a Blynk application. Blynk is a really interesting platform that allows you to create a control application for your projects that runs in a browser or on your mobile. You can find more details about Blynk in my review of the TMC2300-IOT_REF board

image

For this project, I used five virtual IOs, namely

#define VIRTUAL_PIN_DIRECTION  3
#define VIRTUAL_PIN_ENABLE     4
#define VIRTUAL_PIN_DURATION   5
#define VIRTUAL_PIN_STARTANGLE 6
#define VIRTUAL_PIN_ENDANGLE   7

Each virtual pin has it own handler function, that sets the value of a specific variable of the Arduino sketch. When the "Enable" button is pressed, the servo responsible for the motion is started and the servo that rotates the camera is moved as smoothly as possible. The servo position is updated every 100 ms by the code in the PeriodicJob function

// Called once per second by the Blynk timer
void periodicJob()
{
  if (enable)
  {
    if (millis() >= endMillis)
    {
      enable = false;
#ifdef SERVO_MOTION
      motionServo.write(SERVO_PWM_STOP);
#endif      
    }
  }

  if (enable)
  {
    Serial.print("Periodic job: currAngle: ");
    Serial.print(currAngle);
    Serial.println();
    
    greenLedStatus = (greenLedStatus == HIGH)? LOW : HIGH;
    digitalWrite(PIN_GREEN, greenLedStatus);
    
    unsigned long delta = millis() - startMillis;
    currAngle = startAngle + (((endAngle - startAngle) * delta) / (duration * 1000));
    rotServo.write(currAngle);   
  }
}

Future works

The platform was a little bit unstable, so I am going to create a self-stabilizing platform for the GoPro. This is the first prototype, but I am still far away from something that really works

image

BOM

Quantiy Description
1 TMC2300-IOT-REF board Link
1 Continuous-rotation servo
1 Micro servo
1 3D-printed board (see github repo)
1 3D-printed pulley (for the servo)
2 3D-printed pulley
1 3D-printed battery holder
1 Powerbank

Source code

Source code available on my github repository at https://github.com/ambrogio-galbusera/cablecam

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  • amgalbu
    amgalbu over 2 years ago in reply to beacon_dave

    I was thinking about a "passive" stabilisation mode to save weight and complexity. something like this

    https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:283925

    but connected to the servo to control camera angle

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  • beacon_dave
    beacon_dave over 2 years ago in reply to amgalbu

    The pro kit often makes serious use of gyro stabilisers for that problem.

    You can see the Photoship One Flyline with gyro attached here on the Kenyon page:
    https://www.ken-lab.com/kenyon-gyro-guide.html 

    and a close up of it in use in this video:
    https://vimeo.com/210061062

    Downside is the noise they make when spun up to speed and the power consumption.

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  • amgalbu
    amgalbu over 2 years ago in reply to beacon_dave

    Thanks beacon_dave. Unfortunately the platform itself is not very stable (especially when with wind that blows perpendicular to the line) but on the other side today's camera have extremely sophisticated algorithm for image stabilisation, so it shouldn't be a big problem 

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  • beacon_dave
    beacon_dave over 2 years ago

    Excellent results and it looks a lot more affordable than the likes of a Photoship One 'Flyline' camera rig for non-professional use.

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  • amgalbu
    amgalbu over 2 years ago in reply to DAB

    Hi DAB

    The idea is to use it to take flyby videos when you can not use a drone. For example to document an indoor event (e.g. at a ball) or when you don't want to out people in danger with a flying drone (for example if you want to take a footage of the crowd at a fair)

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