Mounting Camera for digitisation work

[AdamJames]

Hello there,

I need to digitise a number of large documents (poster size/ A2). I dont want to spend an awful lot of money and was wondering how I could rig up an SLR to a wooden beam? (I work in a converted barn)

Any help would be appreciated. Initially we were going to buy a copystand but we were finding it hard to find an affordable stand that could take pictures of this size document.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Adam

 

[HoppyUK]

Hello there,

I need to digitise a number of large documents (poster size/ A2). I dont want to spend an awful lot of money and was wondering how I could rig up an SLR to a wooden beam? (I work in a converted barn)

Any help would be appreciated. Initially we were going to buy a copystand but we were finding it hard to find an affordable stand that could take pictures of this size document.

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

Adam

Pin them to a wall, tripod, two lights at 45 degrees each side. You will need a very high quality lens, eg macro, to ensure high sharpness in the corners.

You could do it with decent normal lens, but watch for soft corners (use a higher f/number) and there will be some barrel distortion that you can correct in software.

 

[jon ryan]

See if you can hire a copy stand. My Mrs is a historian, so an awful lot of document copying goes on around here - try your local Uni. A proper stand makes life a helluva lot easier. Or not that difficult to build, I'd think: An old enlarger, top of a tripod, a couple of reading lights...

 

[HMansfield]

Two pieces of wood (or similar) between two beams. Rest the camera on the wood with the lens between them, facing down, and use a remote trigger to trip the shutter.

Low ISO, high f number, shutter speed as long as you like.

 

[CT]

See if you can pick up an old enlarger - one with a simple round tubular column. Remove the head and you just need a bracket to attach the camera to the column pointing downwards towards the baseboard. For copying larger documents you can reverse the camera on the column so that it points down behind the baseboard and copy off the floor if need be.

Don't forget that with a copying stand a right angle finder helps to get your eye to the viewfinder without being a contortionist!

Any tripod with a rotating centre column will also easily enable you to do the job (camera pointing down) and might be the most convenient arrangement. That's what I do nowadays.