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There are some projects out there that you look at them and you just think “How has nobody done this sooner?!?”. This is probably not one such project, but it sure looks like a whole lot of fun!
Created by Pedro Callisaya over at DSLR DIY CNC, this one is a vertical grip for your camera that adds WiFi capabilities but also has flashing RGB lights! And best of all, he’s made all of the files available for us to make our own.
I’ve seen quite a few of these 3D printed cinema lens housings over the last few years. We’ve featured some of them here on DIYP and I’ve even designed a couple of focus rings for my own lenses in the past. I’ve not had a go at printing a full housing, though.
They need a lot of plastic to make, and they look 3D printed. Are they really worth it? In this video, Adam Harig at FoxTailWhipz attempts to answer that question by printing one of the housings available for his Tokina 28-70mm f/2.6-2.8 lens.
Don’t you just hate having to deal with plugging in charging cables? Don’t you wish you could just set your camera or device down and it just charges? This is the concept behind smartphone docks. Now, it’s coming to cameras.
Developed by Fatih Arslan, this 3D printable dock lets you set down your Leica M11 (buy here) and charge it straight on your desk. The dock naturally requires a cable, but its plug slots straight into your camera automatically as you rest your camera down.
Cast your minds back. Way back. Back to September 2021. We featured some 3D-printed lens caps from Pedro at DSLR DIY CNC. Well, Pedro’s back with a new update to those 3D-printed lens caps to add new functionality.
One of the biggest problems that pretty much all of us face with lens caps is that we lose them. That’s why we 3D print replacements in the first place. But Pedro’s just modified his to make losing them much more difficult.
On the topic of weird AI cameras, the Paragraphica has to be the weirdest I’ve seen so far. Like the Black Box Camera we featured a couple of months ago, this one creates an image using AI. Unlike the Black Box Camera, which takes a picture of the scene, uses AI to determine what’s in the scene and then uses that to generate a prompt for the AI to make an image, this one uses GPS data.
There’s no lens at all on this “camera”. It figures out where you are based on the GPS data. From there, it determines the time of day, weather conditions and what your surroundings look like. This generates the prompt that the Paragraphica uses to create its output image. Not surprisingly, it’s powered by a Raspberry Pi.
Despite being referred to as on-camera microphones, the array of such microphones from companies like Rode, Deity, Sennheiser and others are just as capable when used as an off-camera microphone, too. However, the one problem with using them off-camera is that the cables supplied with them are extremely short. After all, they’re only designed to go from your hotshoe to your microphone socket.
Even if you do pick up a long third-party cable, these microphones aren’t designed for long cable runs. The best option is to use them wirelessly. That, too, can be tricky on the end of a boom pole. However, Caleb Pike at DSLR Video Shooter has created a great-looking solution, called the MicBack, to solve this problem with several small on-camera shotgun microphones.
There are a wide range of continuous LED lights on the market these days, from small to large and cheap to expensive. Many of them have some fantastic and advanced features, including app control, DMX and crazy effects modes. Sometimes, though, you just need something small and simple. That’s where this creation from Luke Willmott steps in.
It’s a modular 3D printable 10-30W COB LED spotlight with options for barndoors, gel filters, an OLED display, infrared remote control, temperature monitoring and more. The design is based around a VGA heatsink to keep the COB LED cool, controlled by a Raspberry Pi Pico and Meanwell LDH driver. It holds a lot of potential, particularly for small-scale sets.
This definitely ranks highly amongst the oddest camera mounting jobs I’ve ever seen. This one-time-use camera rig from Thomas Renck mounts to the top of a clay pigeon. Yes, those things. Then it’s fired out of the trap to be brought back down to earth by a shotgun. If you’re lucky. If you’re not lucky – depending on your perspective – it might just be brought back down by simple gravity. At least the camera would survive.
It’s an odd experiment, for sure, but it allowed Thomas to get some pretty unique and interesting footage. The footage isn’t of amazing quality, though, because it was built around a $28 keyring camera, with a 3D printed spinning mount. Actually, the mount’s quite ingenious, keeping the camera pointed in a single direction while the clay spins through the air.
Panoramas: a great format for (in my opinion) most photography. Dramatic landscape? Make it panoramic. Artsy architectural photo? Panoramic. Wanna make that softball game look a little more like Ben-Hur? Panoramic, of course. Weddings? Well… never mind. So as a panoramic enthusiast, and someone who enjoys shooting film, I’ve had my eye on several panoramic film cameras. Unfortunately, a true, full panorama camera can be very costly, like the Hasselblad XPan (>$3,000) or the Fuji GX617 (>$2,000).
There are also swing lens cameras, which use a mechanical method of capturing a panorama. The lens of the camera pivots or “swings” in a horizontal arc, exposing the film to the panorama as it moves. This mechanical motion can add distortion to photos which may be a desirable effect for some. A handful of companies produced these cameras, like the Widelux F7 (<$1000) used notably by Jeff Bridges behind the scenes of his films, or the more affordable Horizon Kompkt (<$200).
This is one of the oddest and most curious cameras I’ve ever seen. It has a lens and a sensor and can actually record the real scene in front of you, but it doesn’t do that. Instead, it detects what’s in your scene using AI and turns it into a text description. This text description is then fed into an image-generating AI whereby it makes an image based on that description. And that’s the “photo” you end up with.
As I said, it’s a curious camera and a very interesting concept. The camera itself is very unassuming. Essentially it’s a twin-lens camera, much like a twin-lens reflex (without the reflex bit), in a big black box. It has a waist-level viewfinder on top and the actual camera lens below, along with a big red shutter button on the front. Shortly after you hit that button, it spits out an Instax print of the AI-generated scene.
Udi Tirosh is an entrepreneur, photography inventor, journalist, educator, and writer based in Israel. With over 25 years of experience in the photo-video industry, Udi has built and sold several photography-related brands. Udi has a double degree in mass media communications and computer science.
Alex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe
Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.
John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
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