Home-made Light-stand (2) — Copper Clad Cable Spiral Lamp
This Spiral cable Lamp was the earliest I made in England. While stay in London, I used a
Film Labo’ where many Japanese photographer were taking their film to be processed.
Photographer is the observer of the world and the human life. And the people who is
developing their films are yet another kind of the observer. —– By watching the subjects
in my film, the owner of the Labo’ seemed to have noticed who I am, and asked me
“Do you know electronics ?” “Yah, a bit” “Do you know about this machine ? Can you repair ?”
—– It was a hefty spot welder. Hefty because of it got really hefty transformer inside, still
its structure is rather simple. “OK, I’ll check it with my tool tomorrow”. = Next day, I found
the welder’s brake down was caused by a micro-switch in the timer controller and I replaced it.
= Here, working again. The owner was very impressed, not only a photographer carrying a
test equipment but actually able to repair the machine. (He knew, knowing and able to do is
not the same thing.) “OK, in exchange, you develop those 10 films free” “Oh, sure”
I like a kind of relationship which doesn’t involve a money = I help you, so you help me.
And I started to use their small room in their studio as my office and in exchange, if
anything repair kind of needs happened, I’ll help them. Almost like an in-hose engineer. 🙂
(That’s how I got an experience to deal with 2500 V, 5000 WS studio type flash etc )
But to carry out some repair, in a awkward corner of the big studio space, or under the film
processing line, I needed to have a work-lamp. I made this Spiral Lamp of which all the
materials were piled up in a corner of the studio where used be a huge vegetable storage
in a corner of “used to be the Covent Garden Flower and Vegetable Market”.
(So, I know the Before and After of the Covent Garden Market ! 🙂 )
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Copper Clad Cable is not common Japan where the main voltage is 100 V. So, I first seen it in
this country. The cable was covered by a copper tube hence it is quite solid and fire resistant,
still having certain flexibility or able to bend. Most of work lamp was wire caged to protect
glass light bulb = so, I got an idea to use this cable itself to make protective cage around the bulb
—– then wall mount switch-box was fixed as its base. (Socket was fixed to the end of the cable
using Epoxy glue). —– this is yet another minimalist’s approach though, all what we need are
there and perfectly functioning. It may looks odd and a bit awkward to change a bulb though,
it worked perfect for my purpose. Is there anything wrong with it ?
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PS : A quite few people, even the electrician who came to my room to re-wiring and the readers,
questioned me, how I could make the Spiral so neat ? = Cable (Piro) was first close wound around
a gutter-pipe about 8 cm, then it was pulled and expanded. Then both end was bent to the
wanted shape. (Of course, the both end, the copper tube was peeled off and the conductors =
two cable were covered with proper insulator sleeves and made proper electric connection.)
Though, I wouldn’t encourage the reader to do this kind of work, unless the person got enough
skill like a qualified electrician. To play with main power is a very dangerous business. It kills.
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Home-made Light-stand (1)
This is one of my home-made Light-stand, second simplest one, which I found in a box
I’ve stashed it away 20 years (?) ago. (the most simplest one was using a bent single pipe.)
Light housing was made out of 7 mm pipe of which the top was rounded by tapping and bent.
Photo Left : Originally it was using very small tungsten bulb for an indicator though, those
bulb doesn’t last long, not mention a problem of heat-up.
So, in this occasion, I changed it to a wite LED (Photo Center) . In this kind of design, the matter
is the “Adjustable Pipe Clamp” = here they were made using shallow Aluminium C-channel,
bent to U-shape. = One screw can loose and tighten everything at once. (Photo Right)
Thanks to LED, it can light up pretty long time from three AA batteries hidden under the base.
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Don’t ask “What is for ?” = You may not ask a painter “Why you sketch this land scape ?”
To see an aluminium pipe and think how to use and to make them into a certain shape and
appropriate structure is a game of creativity. —– simply it is a fun. 🙂
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Zen in Action (3) — Latent Thinking
At moment, I’m in chaos of shifting the mountain of boxes again. Some of the regular readers
may remember, I said the same before, though it was for fitting new window but this time it
is for electric re-wiring. It’s mean, I have to shift those to the window-side to vacate the
wall-side for the electrician to access all the power-points, switches etc. (I’m not happy at all.
= so-called Electric safety standard has been changed and they say all the system has to be
kept-up, blah blah = keep industry busy to make money, but I’m dubious about
why the contract has gone to this company.)
So that, fortunately or unfortunately, I had to dig-up the boxes berried to the bottom which
I haven’t seen since when I moved to here.
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In common-sense, people only has what is essential to the own immediate life, the essential
for the daily life. —– ideally a Buddhist remained in their bare minimum though it’s the matter
of how the person define who he is = a Buddhist bikku (literally a beggar who forsaken all his
possession for a sake of seeking the truth) may needed to have one cloth to cover his body and
one bowl to receive food (then to drink, and take a water to wash himself etc.)
—– in this context when I found that the followers of
Lord Buddha had umbrella, I was very surprised (let alone the umbrella had been already
invented then ! —– this sort of analysis would lead to see the timing when Agama Sutras was
written, or its authenticity.)
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In fine day, still carry an umbrella for if it starts a rain, or carry a bowl in case if anybody
offer a food are all in the speculation (may happen but not on that moment) = in other words,
it’s only in the mind. I wonder what Lord Buddha instructed to this matter to his followers ?
So, the teaching of “Live in the Moment” include the situation “Could happen next moment” too.
So, I carry a mountain of material to make something which could happen in any moment. 😀
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Don’t cling to your thought but leave the matter to the Dharma (occurrence of the Karma).
This “thought” meant be a kind of thinking we are doing in lingual form. —– as a matter of fact,
as Neuroscientists found that 90% of our thinking has been done subconsciously without convert
it to the lingual form. Even when we are in Mushin and totally occupied by one action, our Brain
is still in full working state unless we choose to have meditative state.
This “subconscious thinking” is no other than what we call [intuition], [hunch], and often giving
an [insight], or [inspiration] and those are the very “Latent Thinkings”.
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In comparison, what we learned in lingual form such as somebody’s words or what we learned
from the books will stay as the lingual memories.
We can say “I understood” is in fact, lexical understanding of an abstract notion of the word and
its meanings but not what it is in practice.
But what we experienced and learned in real life always carries the tag of emotion yet this
emotion is very difficult to convert and express in the words, because the tag in the emotion is
a part of the said “Latent Thinkings”. In most of the case, lingual memory stay like a distant
objects and not necessary relate to the emotion hence, it is not necessary takes a part
in the “Latent Thinkings”.
The words “Be careful, it’ll bite you” stay as the words until after you were actually bitten =
Then, it will be imprinted into your subconscious with a pain, and “Be careful” become part of
your “Latent Thinking”.
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This is the very reason why actual practice or experience is so important to our life, and what
Lord Buddha said “Don’t believe what others said but think yourself”
(better still through experiences).
—— (One of my Kinetic Sculpture “Cupidon / Archer” which was made mostly discarded material
—— I’ve picked-up, such as aluminium angles etc. Except an Air-pomp (yellow one) I bought.
—— The motor came from a Cooling-fan ) (Moving image is in youtube —> Click right column)
—– through experiences since my childhood, I knew, such as an aluminium angle is so useful
to make a structure, or such as a discarded printer contain very useful motor etc. = I collected
and stashed them in my room = hence made mountains of junks. So, when like this unexpected
situation occurs, I have to work hard to shift the boxes.
—– bad still, it’s an unusually hot summer.
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Macro Flash-light / Small Flash on Goose-neck
This must be a “You got to be joking” kind of funny, cheap adaptation of a flash for Macro
photography. —– And I would say “Why not” 😀
Since, most of my existing flashes, except Canon 430EX-II are not compatible for the latest DSLR
to give TTL flash control, I needed to buy one for Macro-flash modification which I described
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The flash I found second-hand was 270EX-II, which is using only two batteries hence pretty small and
light enough to mount on top of a Goose-neck, instead to have internal modification I did before.
Decisive fact was that I already have [off the camera flash cable] made by Sunpak more than
20 years ago which was similar to the German SCA300 adapter system used by Metz, Agfa etc.
Sunpak tried to make the adapter for all the cameras which has been started to have new function, not
only ready-light, TTL flash control but even for focus-light for AF which was newly introduced AF camera.
Because of the Camera design was keep changing while adding new function, it was a hard task to
keep-up. —– On the end Sunpak became out of breath and bankrupted.
—– so, on that time lots of Sunpak products became obsolete and sold in a give-away price.
Once, Sunpak was a dominant force in the flash-light market with very innovative design and
versatile system such as the interchangeable head system with Telephoto head, Infra-red head,
Bare-tube head etc. not mention they produced very powerful model as well.
So, when I saw a box-full of their [Flash Extension Cable] in a camera shop, I bought all of them at once,
more than 20 cables for every type of cameras. —– Flash shoe is an awkward component to make
ourselves, (still, I worked to make and modify, such as adding one more TTL contact to Pentax type to
make it Nikon type etc. 🙂 ) therefore, it’s better to keep enough supply of many types in hand,
and it’s got very useful coiled cable as well..
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DSLR camera manufacturer is selling their [Flash Extention Cable] and all of their Female connector has
only 1/4” Tripod screw. = Once flash was put on the cable, it has to be mounted on a stand, otherwise it
has to be held by a hand. In contrast, the best thing of the Sunpak Extension Cable is, male and
female can be coupled, in other words flash can be perched on top of the camera, only 45mm
higher position. So that, it can be changed Flash on the camera to hand-lighting just by pressing release
button (which can be locked as well) hence, as far as I know, this is the best designed [FlashE xtention
Cable] in the history and the materials and the construction are also very good.
———– (Photo above: 1″ Aluminium C-channel is the best to make many structures.
———– And 3/4 ” Square Pipe will just fit inside, hence they can make best coupling system !
———– And they could be easily cut by hand tools, though it’s a very tedious work. 🙂 )
So, my modification was just Epoxy glued female connector on top of a goose-neck and made a small
piece of aluminium channel to connect the goose-neck to the camera bracket which is the in-hose
standard to connect any of my flash-light systems to the cameras.
—– To use the 270EX-II flash as a Macro-flash, thanks to the flexibility of goose-neck, flash can be
positioned (more or less) where ever desired, with or without bouncing diffuser.
—– following photos are the Test sample of each lighting. (Focus and F were Fixed)
————- (The Lens was CanonEF Macro 100mm F2.8 with home made “Ultra Proxer” / F2.8)
————- (This last set of sample photo was using F11 —— slight difference of lighting changes
————- the character of the subject ! —– See the difference on enlarged images )
(And the sample photos in the field will be followed ) 😉
—– those photos are taken in my room (I’m still busy dealing with boxes 🙂 ) of a small visitor,
Beetle, head to tale 6mm or 1/4″ big, using Ultra Proxer on Canon EF 100mm Macro
with 270EX-II flash and extension cable.
(
——— (Photo Left : 100mm Macro at F16 + Ultra Proxer, 270EX Flash with Diffuser — taken x2 size.
——— Photo Right : same setting but at F 2.8 )
Close-up Lens on EF-Macro Lens
Well, those top two photos were taken by Canon EF Macro 100mm F2.8 Lens alone.
This Macro lens has internal focus system and it will be focused down to the life-size.
For general macro work, it is convenient to use though, for me, life-size is often just
not close enough. So that I specially made additional Proxer / Close-up lens my self.
As I detailed in the post, By using the Proxer, the Lens can close to x2 size, and
in addition, it creates almost phenomenal out-of-focus Bokhe.
The Bokhe created by this additional lens looks almost like Air-blush Graphic work.
Still, since this Proxer was made out of the front element of a Zoom Lens, it got double
lens Achromatic construction, no Chromatic aberration was appeared and the focused
image is quite sharp, corner to corner, even when the lens aperture was fully open.
All those photos, except top two, F-aperture was set to F2.8 and the Camera was
set to AV mode. Auto focus does work though, as the nature of this kind of
close-up work, I used manual focus.
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Ultra heavy Proxer — Close-up Lens from TV Zoom
Those photos were taken by Zeiss 85 mm F 1.4 lens, with my handmade Proxer was
attached to it. The Proxer = Close-up lens was in fact, a front element of a Canon
TV-Zoom lens which I’ve cannibalized from a broken lens. (hence cost nothing 😉 )
As the original lens was a very expensive TV lens, it has a very high-quality
Achromatic lens. ( Even ED glass may have used in its construction.)
In most of the case, it is not very difficult to disassemble the lens —– in this case,
after unscrew 14 small screws, the front Lens was disengaged from its focusing helicoid.
—– then it was glued to a 67 mm filter ring. (filter glass was removed beforehand)
Front-element of this lens works as a close-up lens, hence with 85 mm lens it act like
a life-size Macro converter. —– And with large 1.4 F-aperture, it gives very shallow
depth of field. (and very big Bokhe ! — Still, the focused image itself is quite sharp ! )
——(Metric ruler was shot in 45 degree. Left: F1.4 / Center: F2.8 / Right: F5.6)
Though, this 3 cm thick solid glass in a solid metal helicoid is really heavy, almost
the same weight of 85 mm lens itself. 😀
(The photo above : Left was taken F1.4, but Right photo was F5.6 )
(In those photos, look at how the single hair of fluff was captured on F 1.4
= Please click and enlarge twice)
As you can see from the photos above, off-focused Bokhe is a bit too much for
most of the people’s taste though, that is what I’ve been after.
(This effect couldn’t be mimicked by PS ! )
—– to get this effect, I tried many Soft Focus lenses, Filters, Pinhole Photo,
Double-density Pinhole, even Double Focus in Double exposure.
But there is no sharp core in a Pinhole photo, and the Double exposure has
the trouble to keep the subject exactly in the same position etc etc.
= After many many years of attempt, now I think, I got what I wanted.
Only a problem is, this TV-Zoom Proxer gives only life-size close-up image.
May be I need to find another lens which got longer focal length. 😀
Still, it’s a start.
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Ultra Proxer — Recycled from Old zoom lens
Proxer is an old name to call Close-up lens which attach on front of the lens.
The lens I’m talking here is a front lens element I’ve scavenged from an old zoom lens 85~210 mm F 3.8, sold under many different names —– the photo was in the previous post (first photo, Front lens was near the left end).
Most of the close-up lens consist simple convex, single meniscus lens mounted on a filter frame. Same idea to put a magnifier before camera lens and take close-up photo. It was convenient to have a small adapter lens to take closer picture, as in the old days there was no such things like a macro setting on the Primary lens (Standard lens).
—– To make a high-performance Proxer, I did some cut and bonding works with epoxy glue, which was worthwhile to create a treasure out of junk. 🙂
Photo left : Don’t hesitate to hack-saw a lens barrel. Once disassembled and the glass was removed, even a precision optical device, is a piece of metal. = What it used to be is only in your mind. On this moment you are dealing the work to create something new. What required here is a careful but very simple and boring push and pull work. 😀
Center photo : To the front lens, hack-sawed front barrel (which got 58mm filter screw ) was screwed back and a filter ring was bonded to its rear side with epoxy glue.
Photo right : The finished close-up lend was attached on the front of the Canon EF 100 mm Macro lens, which also has 58 mm filter size.
You might be wondering, while having macro lens already, and having a skill to use the lens in reverse etc. = all sorts of close-up trick, why do I need to have yet another close-up lens. —– well, all of my Macro lenses were down to the life-size, in other words, they take a picture of 36mm x 24mm is the closest. I simply wanted to close a bit more. (My attention tend to go rather small things. 🙂 )
—– And a real intention was to have much more exaggerated out of focus Bokhe. (I’m tired with clear images which is everywhere and too easy to come by today.)
Photo left : With this close-up lens, when the master lens, 100 mm Macro lens was set to the infinity, a small dole (36 mm tall) looks like this. (taken F 2.8)
Center Photo : With close-up lens, when the Master Macro lens was set to the life-size, it produces x2 larger image (dole’s head is 10mm). Have look the Bokhe in F 2.8 = max open). (This Bokhe is quite close to the Olympus Zuiko 50 mm F 2 Macro lens ! )
Photo right : A small beetle who happen to came to my room (it’s too hot these days, the window was fully open) this photo was taken with a bounced flash-light with F 11.
Unlike most of the Proxer, this home-made close-up lens has double lens chromatic structure, and fully coated. = Think, a cost of common cheap Proxer, and a Front lens which is the most crucial part of the lens structure in a zoom lens.
= Difference of quality is obvious. As you can see it in those sample photos.
A photo of a moth parched on the wall in my room, taken by EF 100 mm Macro with the handmade Proxer. = With F 2.8 the depth of focus is really shallow still, in the focused area, the image is very sharp.
This is a test shot of the screen of a Tablet (a photo of my umbrella). This close-up lens maintained very high quality of the image = Very even, corner to corner. And this is at F 2.8 ! (See details, by click it, and again)
Left photo is Macro lens alone and about 1/2 size. Right photo is, with close-up lens but Master lens was set to Infinity. Hence this combination can take photo from infinity to 1/1 and with this Proxer to x2. (By the way, Canon 5D mk-III has dreadful red-color cast when ISO was set to 6400. In AWB and in any setting. Though, at ISO 100 much better. = See the photos below)
(Photo left : 5D but Mk-II. Photo Right : The ISO setting was 100 = Much better !)(Those are hand-held photos = only for Color reference.) To be fair, I show you the photos by Nikon D810’s color in similar setting.
(Photo Left : Nikon D810 — ISO 3600 Photo Right : Same but ISO 100 Both with Micro Nikkor 55mm F3.5 — 1/2 )
Higher ISO setting mean, very low out-put of image sensor has to be amplified electronically to its limit. While amplifying to such extent, still linearity has to be maintained, while the out-put of each BGR may not having exactly the same character.
= Can of warm is opened. 🙂 In the same time, higher amplification also amplify the noise as well.
—– I admire and praise the people who managed it and brought the benefit of very high ISO setting even if it was not (yet) perfect.
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Junk Lens — How to recycle ?
After digital revolution, analogue age old lenses become almost a junk.
Simply, the camera and the lens today are too different from their predecessor.
As the lens has to work with the camera which got so many functions therefore
the lens also needs to function such as auto focus, electronically position controlled
F-aperture, distance-coded focus not mention high zoom ratio, of which the zoom
position was also electronically coded. (Those code were used to control Flash-light)
= In order to deal with all those electronics, the lens having its own microchip and
able to communicate with camera’s main CPU.
Without having those electronics, lens couldn’t be used on the camera —– except
Canon EOS (It can take any lens include a Pinhole in AV-Mode, of course with
manual mode as well. — But, Nikon couldn’t make even a single image out of pinhole,
without giving quite complicated procedure to set-up the camera side. )
Though, don’t misunderstand, even today, the optics is still optics, it works on the
same principal, hence if you get a convex lens and concave lens scavenged out of old
camera lens, it would make a telescope for a kids to experiment. Or use them to project
an image or focus LED light etc etc.
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The lens design has also changed a lot such as the use of aspherical lens (in fact most
of them are a so-called Compound lens, aspherically moulded plastic was stacked on
a glass lens) —– nevertheless, I admit, today’s lens is very well designed in deed.
(Though, why they became so big and heavy ? — considering, how compact camera
became so small and light, while able to take more or less the same picture. 😀 )
In those aspects, may be there is no point to give a damn to the old lens though, still,
such as F-aperture diaphragm has changed almost nothing (only driving mechanism
may have changed to motor etc. And the front lens is still, good achromatic lens.
Not mention the focusing helicoid which is impossible to make by ourselves, still
having lots of use, not only in the photography.
= We can scavenge a lots out of such old lens. —– As a matter of fact, good old
non-plastic lens is far easier to disassemble and Re-use. (Plastic built lenses were
NOT designed to be serviced as they were built by snap fit or heat-weld.)
(Lens above is a Canon TV lens, it must had a price of many thousands of pounds. )
The best thing is, we can find those old lens in a camera shop’s junk box,
with a price of couple of pounds, if not free.
To disassemble those lens, there may not need to have more than small
+ AND – screw drivers. (but need to use the brain a lot = it is a puzzling game)
In coming posts, I’ll show you what I’m going to do with those “Components”
saved from old lens.
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Flying Angel — Wire Figure
This is my Angel, yet another wire-figure I made on 2007. (So, those photos were
taken by that old Kodak camera, and the photos were clopped —- hence, pretty low
quality photos) But not PSed, the figure was really in the air (hanged from the tree).
When I brought this to a gathering of Dorkbot, the figure made a well known artist
Anne Bean, frozen 5 min—– ( I was frightened, such good artist can memorize all the
structure and able to make identical copy 🙂 )
Strangely you may found, this lady has no neck. Her right hand holding the head. 🙂
Wire used was 1.6mm garden wire, and I was planned to make it x5 size, it’s mean
life-size, by 8mm copper tube though, I realized that, if I made this in my room,
I can’t take it out 😀
—– One day, when I got big studio, I’ll do it (though, seemingly never happen 😀 )
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