Can you help me reverse engineer this camera rig.

Daftlander · September 26, 2018

So I have been trying and failing to build a motion control camera rig for my stop motion projects.

The theory is simple using Dragonframe (software) I can control stepper motors to have very repeatable motions that coincide with the right frames so if you biff a take you can just have the camera move back to the right spot. I have already built a successful slider but I have been stuck on the Pan and Tilt head for a long while.

I found a great Youtube Channel Edu Puertas who has built a load of his own equipment including a very successful version of a rig. Which can be seen at the beginning of this video and in a few more angles in this one here. Unfortunately he's never gone into detail about how he built it although he has repeatedly said he did it for, "no money". (You can buy prosumer things for this, but they tend to be for timelapses and the like, not the use case I'm looking for. Also they start at like $1000)

SO. I'm trying to figure out what I need in terms of tools, methods and parts to make a clone of this bad boy in the attached image. I would greatly appreciate any help you guys can offer.

Red: Is some kind of worm gearbox but for the life of me I can't find anywhere that sells NEMA 23's with this kind of gearbox.

Blue: I would assume is some sort of bearing, but what kind do you use in a project like this? How is it attached to both brackets? Why are there white blocks between the brackets?

Green: Is a stepper motor he sometimes uses to adjust shutters on fancier lenses. Dragonframe handles focus. Don't worry so much about this part. I usually shoot with a 50mm prime lens.

Yellow: Is the part that has stumped me the most. I have been able to make heads that can tilt, badly and unreliably, but I get the principle. This belt driven doodad handles pan, and I can't get my head round how it works. I can't even figure out what search terms to begin looking with.

Any help, ideas and pointers are welcome.

As a side note my working title for this project is Níðhöggr because I like to name things after Norse mythology, but it has been oddly prophetic as the name translates to Curse-Striker, and this bloody thing has certainly made me curse and strike it.