One of the hardest things about doing projects is oddly enough, documenting them. New tools/sites like Instructables and Flickr make it a lot easier, but there’s a lot of room for the hardware/setup we’re using to be more Maker-documenting friendly. One of the challenges is taking photos from the same spot, over and over and not touching the camera – most digital still ones, well, the cheaperish ones do not come with remotes, I found a cheap-ish ($300) digital video and still camera called the Supacam. It plugs in to AC power (so it won’t turn off) and it comes with a remote – there’s a tripod mount and I’m using a “TrackerPod” to control the camera on a little robotic base. I also have a clamp that can stick the camera on most benches (I got this years ago, you can make your own, easy). The camera also has a flip around LCD screen so you can glance, zoom and take photos/video while you’re working. It’s unclear if this is a best set up, but it’s getting closer. With this set up, you could work on just about anywhere in a workbench type setting and document away.
Dremel is doing a lot of interesting tools lately (See our short Dremel Stylus review here). I’m wondering if they would consider a workbench camera set up. They could get a camera OEM (like Supacam) – rebrand the camera and ship a ton of accessories made for documenting your projects, even a cheap lighting set up (we’ve posted tons here)…I’ll send them off an email and see what they think, Makers post up what you’re using in the comments – What would the ultimate (inexpensive) project documenting set up look like? I suppose the Kodak WiFi camera is a good option, but it would need a lot of software work to get “no touch” photo send as you document.
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