Nodal rail for panoramas - advice please

Tom Pinchenzo

Tom Pinchenzo

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Tom
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Hi everyone,

I'm looking to get a nodal rail thing for eliminating paralax error with panos. Dedicated pieces of kit seem absurdly expensive (https://www.photospecialist.co.uk/really-right-stuff-mpr-cl-ii-multi-rail) but you can get these long tripod mounts that look like they would do the trick (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pig-Iron-TP-200-Arca-Swiss-Compatible/dp/B07R955DDQ) especially seeing as all you're trying to achieve is holding your camera a bit further back...

Does anyone have any experience using this type of kit? And has anyone found any cheap ways of achieving the same thing?

Thanks!
Tom

[edit] the only downside I can foresee with the long rail is that you can't attach your camera in vertical orientation....
 
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Yes, as David said, a cheapy (all things are relative) off eBay worked fine for me. And easy to use for stereoscopic too.
 
Glad for found one for sensible money.

You'll need to spend a bit of time figuring out the right nodal point for each lens you plan to use. I'm sure you'll be fine, but ifyou get stuck, give me a shout.
 
Boots said:
Glad for found one for sensible money.

You'll need to spend a bit of time figuring out the right nodal point for each lens you plan to use. I'm sure you'll be fine, but ifyou get stuck, give me a shout.
Click to expand...
Thanks Paul,

Do you have to get it quite accurate??
 
The advantage of proper kit like the Nodal Ninja range is that not only does it hold the camera Inthe correct portrait orientation , but you can also do 360x180 pans and multi row pans.
They can also have the no parralax point set semi permently for quick setup.
They also have click stop rotators, so you get the correct overlap.

For landscape pans, you can mostly do them hand held, with no extra equipment at all. Though close objects can cause parralax problems.

Probably the best bracket on the market for medium sized mirror less cameras with normal sized
lenses, is the Nodal Ninja 3 mark 3.

I have one of these, not as good as the latest but works brilliantly

www.ebay.co.uk

Fanotec Nodal Ninja 3 mkII pano head | eBay

Panoramakopf Nodal Ninja 3 II für 360 Grad Panorama-Fotografie. Das Stativ wiegt 475g. Gebraucht, in sehr gutem Zustand.
www.ebay.co.uk
 
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Tom Pinchenzo said:
Do you have to get it quite accurate??
Click to expand...

Please don't take me to be any kind of an expert, perhaps I'm just a page ahead in the manual!

I didn't do it especially accurately. Looking at my spreadsheet (which I see has quite a lot of gaps), I recorded to the nearest 5mm.

There doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to the distance, for example my 24mm needs a different setting to my 17-40. The lenses are not of a markedly different size, and a similar focal length, so I was surprised there was such a difference.

I did add a comment to me table, which might be helpful, that a rough and ready rule of thumb is to start with the front optic located above the axis of rotation (i.e. the ballhead). But that definitely did NOT hold for some lenses, like my 85mm.

For my nodal rail, the scale ran from zero at the far end, to 180mm under the camera. That seemed the wrong way round to me, but perhaps that's just me.
 
Tom Pinchenzo said:
Thanks Paul,

Do you have to get it quite accurate??
Click to expand...
I set my NN to the nearest 0.5mm and that is accurate enough for interiors.
It does not need to be anywhere near so accurate for landscapes.
But once you find the accurate point for a particular lens and focal length , why not do it accurately it is just as easy.
It will be a different point for every focal length when using a zoom.
 
Tom Pinchenzo said:
That’s a pain!
Click to expand...

It is a fact of life. the entrance pupil relates to focal length.
It also relates to the lens construction. Some zooms vary more than others.
I only use my 18-55 Fuji at its widest for pans, so I only have one setting for it.

Nodal Ninja give a whole list of settings that people have established.
But it is better to find your own, it never takes more than half an hour, and that is it.
 
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