Ok, just returned from speaking at the Better Light photography conference. My topics covered Panos, Rollouts, Spinouts and Dragouts. The image for this post falls into the Spinout category and is created completely in the camera (no Photoshop or 3d rendering). The mechanics of how this shot was captured starts with a single row of horizontal pixels that is stationary and ‘scans’ the scene as the scene is rotated 360 degrees. For all you abstract art junkies out there, any thoughts? like it, hate it? It was quite a juggling act keeping glassware from hitting each other and breaking.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Hey Mark,
VERY cool. Is there a tutorial out there for this. How can I buy or make the spinning table?
Thx,
Steve
Hello Steve! Great to hear from you. I think creating these is a little bit of an equipment niche. Let me start with the equipment used, then elaborate on how the image is captured and finally speculate on how you could do it yourself.
1. The Equipment. This can get a little spendy.
-Large format (4×5) Camera
-lens
-Better Light scan back insert (http://www.betterlight.com/price.html)
-Better Light Pano/Wideview adapter
2. Capture Process.
The Better Light scan back has a single row of up to 9000 pixels that, in normal operation, is moved across the film plane similar to a flatbed scanner. When you add the Pano/Wideview adapter, the single row of pixels gets moved to the center of the lens and locked there before the scanning start. Once the sensor is in that position, the computer tells the Pano adapter (a precision stepper motor) to start turning as the scanning begins. The Pano adapter can be on the tripod (under the camera) turning the camera to make a panoramic image OR the adapter can be in front of the camera turning an object(s). For the Spinnouts I use the latter. Technically, the sensor should be in the vertical orientation. This creates a Rollout. I rotated the inserts 90 degrees so that the sensor was in the horizontal position. Next, I set the adapter to turn 360 degrees. For the image above I was just over 10,000 pixels wide. I have some images that go over 60,000 pixels wide by the 9000 pixels high.
3. DIY.
I think there is some script the takes a single row of pixels from a group of normal digital image and puts them together something similar to what I get in one shot (scan). Shooting 10,000 to 60,000 images doesn’t sound like fun to me though and getting a motor to turn 60,000 equal distances in 360 degrees might be tough.
So, there you have it in a nut shell. Clear as mud?
Hello Mark,
I came across your work when I looked into the Dicomed. It was offered in The Netherlands and seems a bit rare overhere. I got impressed with your work and it motivated me to get started somehow. In the meantime I bought the Dicomed allthough it wasn’t working at that time. Since then I was able to acquire a nice cambo stand with a linhof head, calumet from 1967 and a horseman 45HD. The lenses are still an issue, but beside the light a more pressing problem is the way I want to get the images into a more reliable computer then the Apple 2300c I got with the Dicomed. I cannt get it connected using appletalk. I picked up a powermac and now I have to find a scsi 50pins card for this 9600. And hopefully get this as a bridge to my more recent Apple with Photoshop.
Once I get this solved I am going to build turntables and other contraptions. I ve some wild ideas. If you have some suggestions I would appreciate it to learn from you. Ah, allmost forgot to mention the Hoseman Lightrbrush that I have bought for a nickle and a dime. So this to must deliver some interesting pictures.
Thanks for inspiring me into a complete new way of making pictures of another dimension.
Greetz Gerrit van Dijk, Zwolle The Netherlands
Hello and thanks for the comment Gerrit.
I, too, used the Dicomed prior to purchasing the Betterlight system. You are now part of a fairly small but VERY supportive community. Mike Collete, the owner/creator of Better Light scan backs, came from Dicomed and has some posts on the Better Light forum regarding them. My 1st recommendation would be to register with the forum and search all the Dicomed posts for useful information. If the following question is not answered in the previous posts, I would post it to the group — What is the most up-to-date computer/OS/connecter setup I can use for a Dicomed? (http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/betterlight/)
I have quite a bit of SCSI hardware laying around so after you figure out what the best scenario for you is, let me know and I’ll see if I have anything you can use.
I’m about to take on a number of ‘Prospective over Time’ projects that I will be documenting on my photography blog markvandersys.com if you care to follow my progress.
By the way, I have lots of family in the Netherlands (my uncle in Appeldoorn looks to be not far from you). Next time I’m there, I’ll try and arrange a visit.
Mark