Lens hood?

[malacca]

So, I'm sure a lot of you have experienced this - flying in a direction where the sun is glaring down on the camera, and the video starts flickering as the sun is blocked for milliseconds by the props. Seems like a simple lens hood would fix this problem. I'm going to put a piece of electrical tape or something along the top edge of the lens housing and see what happens.

Has anyone else come up with a more elegant solution to this problem?

 

[Cr8tive_leo]

viewtopic.php?f=26&t=14202&hilit=lens+hood

 

[panhygrous pantler]

http://www.phantompilots.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=14202&hilit=lens+hood

This guy is asking about solutions for Vision +, not a Gopro.

 

[malacca]

http://www.phantompilots.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=14202&hilit=lens+hood

This guy is asking about solutions for Vision +, not a Gopro.

True.

I'm going to try the tape tomorrow and see what happens. Sounds like it should work fine. It'd be nice if there was a real lens hood. Oh well.

 

[4wd]

The issues to consider are that you won't be able to pop the cap back on and additional weight might upset the gimbal balance.
Tape probably not enough on its own, but anything rigid enough to withstand air blast will push down more than its normal weight.

 

[DBS]

The issues to consider are that you won't be able to pop the cap back on and additional weight might upset the gimbal balance.
Tape probably not enough on its own, but anything rigid enough to withstand air blast will push down more than its normal weight.

True dat.... and anything not rigid enough may likely flap around in the wind and introduce vibrations... would be cool if we could slide off the lens cap and slide on some sort of light weight rigid sunscreen... mine seems to do ok with the weight of the lens cap the few times I forgot to take it off .

 

[malacca]

Qualified success! I tried to emulate a scenario where the flickering would occur. I failed to do so, but note the incredible difference in how washed out the non-lens hood video is compared to the one with the lens hood. And by 'lens hood', of course, I mean my meticulously applied electrical tape, of which I have also attached a picture. Okay, maybe not so meticulous - you can see it in the upper left where I put down a little low. The little piece of tape behaved nicely and did not flap around at all.

The gimbal had no trouble with the weight of the tape, which is next to nothing, I guess. I'll have to remove it after each flight to get the lens cap on, so that is not ideal. Maybe I can find someone to 3-d print a light plastic one that I can slip on and off. Or maybe I should start a KickStarter about this...maybe not...

Sorry, I couldn't figure out how to embed the YouTube videos in the post.


http://youtu.be/MWLDh4HYdTo
http://youtu.be/oEHD-guV1iY

 

[Tripnman]

You might want to check THIS THREAD over in the Vision forum. A user there custom designed a hood for his PV2 and put it up for sale at Shapeways. He might be willing to do one for the PV2+ as well.

 

[steele9999]

I'm thinking that the "lens hood" will also improve footage shot at night and dusk. It should eliminate or reduce the light falling on the lens from the phantoms lights.

 

[malacca]

You might want to check THIS THREAD over in the Vision forum. A user there custom designed a hood for his PV2 and put it up for sale at Shapeways. He might be willing to do one for the PV2+ as well.

Just PM'd him and he said he's working on a filter holder and then he will do a lens hood. I hope he does it quickly...

 

[ResevorDG]

Very cool, this prop shadow was a problem with P2V as well. The electrical tape is not bad but something slips on would be great.
As far as no lens cap goes, if you keep the phantom in a case it's probably not a big deal.

 

[ocphantom]

You might want to check THIS THREAD over in the Vision forum. A user there custom designed a hood for his PV2 and put it up for sale at Shapeways. He might be willing to do one for the PV2+ as well.

Just PM'd him and he said he's working on a filter holder and then he will do a lens hood. I hope he does it quickly...

Any update on this?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Dirty Bird]

True dat.... and anything not rigid enough may likely flap around in the wind and introduce vibrations... would be cool if we could slide off the lens cap and slide on some sort of light weight rigid sunscreen... mine seems to do ok with the weight of the lens cap the few times I forgot to take it off .

You could use a small strip of black construction paper. Wrap it around the lens barrel, and tape the "tube" with a piece of Scotch tape. It doesn't have to protrude very far. After the flight, it would just slip the tube off the lens barrel and the cap can be reinstalled. The tube is available for your next flight.

 

[Mosleyh]

Here's my P2V+ lens hood. It slides onto the lens barrel and is secured with a small bit of tape or a small rubber band. <1gm so it doesn't affect the gimbal balance and designed to be out of the frame for still photography. Since the FOV for video is slightly narrower than the FOV for stills, the hood can be slid forward slightly (and re-secured) when shooting video only.



https://www.shapeways.com/model/2065586 ... erialId=25

 

[Joeg1937]

I noticed in the video there was a slight vignetting at the top but otherwise it looks good

 

[Mosleyh]

I noticed in the video there was a slight vignetting at the top but otherwise it looks good

What video?

 

[Feli]

That looks awesome - any possibility of you making one that allows us to use filters on P2V+?

 

[Mosleyh]

That looks awesome - any possibility of you making one that allows us to use filters on P2V+?

That's what I plan to tackle next.

My first prototype of the one above started out with a way to add filters, but I had to abandon that design. The main problem is weight because of how delicate the P2V+ gimbal is. I'm not sure how much weight it could take before becoming unbalanced. The best idea that I have at the moment is to be able to remove the glass from a 46mm filter and put it in the hood somehow. The downside there is that you wouldn't be able to rotate a polarizer unless i left a bit of play in it and then you'd have to rotate it with your fingers which would put fingerprints on it. That arrangement would work for ND filters though.

 

[Mako79]

LOL. This is just prototype. Needs a nice coat of black.

From this

To this

Needs proper testing.
Going to wait till the winds dies down here.

And please ignore the rubber band. That's also under testing (i hope i never have to test it). It's an alternative to the anti-drop pins but it allows for absorption on crashes. The entire gimbal and camera should pop out and lower the stress on the arm on crashes. What normally happens is the immediate stop causes the arm to break from the inertia.

Best is to avoid it all together..

 

[HunterSK]

Here's my P2V+ lens hood. It slides onto the lens barrel and is secured with a small bit of tape or a small rubber band. <1gm so it doesn't affect the gimbal balance and designed to be out of the frame for still photography. Since the FOV for video is slightly narrower than the FOV for stills, the hood can be slid forward slightly (and re-secured) when shooting video only.



https://www.shapeways.com/model/2065586 ... erialId=25

Hi Mosleyh,

I ordered your Shapeways hood a few days ago and will pick it up in a few weeks while I'm travelling.

Hope it does the job, looks like a good design. What kind of tape do you recommend to secure the lens hood from rotating, coming off etc? I was going to use a thin strip of black cloth tape.