[MF3D.FORUM:875] Re: Brackets

[Brian Reynolds <reynolds@xxxxxxxxx>]

Chris Schneberger wrote:
> Can anyone recommend a flach bracket that will allow me enough room
> to mount two TLRs side by side?  And where might I find an extra
> mounting screw for the second camera?
> 

What type and how big a bracket you get depends on the film advance
mechanism your TLRs have.  Cameras with knob advance can be put closer
together than those with cranks.

I use a simple Hama flash bracket for my Lubitels (knob advance).  It
is a long rectangle that has one mounting screw in a fixed position
and one in a slot for sliding.  There is no hand grip and it is made
from fairly light weight aluminum.  Even though the Lubitels are very
light you can see their tops lean together when they hang on the strap
attached to the outer lugs.  The cameras also tend to toe in.

I think you'd be better off building a bracket from aluminum angle
stock (to solve both the bending and toe in problems) than buying one.
The biggest problem is that the tripod mounting point on TLRs (or MF
cameras in general) tends to be pretty far from the back of the
camera.  I think one leg of the angle stock would have to be at least
two inches.  Three inches would let you sit the camera on the bracket.

The other problem is that many TLRs have these silly little feet on
the bottom so that you can put them down on a flat surface.  The feet
are further off the bottom surface of the camera than the tripod
mounting point is (otherwise the camera would rock on the tripod
mount), so if you over tighten the tripod screw you can warp the
camera bottom.  (Rollei even made a very expensive tripod mounting
plate for its TLRs to over come this problem.)  You could drill holes
or cut slots in the angle stock to clear the feet.

Another possibility would be to build a small version of Greg Erker's
hyper stereo bar.  Greg's home page is at
<URL:http://www.angelfire.com/ca/erker/>.  Unfortunately it looks like
the link to his hyper bar is broken.

The idea is to make a mounting plate for each camera (solving the foot
problem) that can attach to a length of aluminum square tube at
various points.  You could limit it to one separation, or one fixed
position and one variable (either with a slot or multiple holes) so
you could vary the lens spacing.

The tripod mount of most cameras is 1/4x20.  You can get these at a
camera store (Hama and others make them), or you could go t a hardware
store and pay a lot less for either a 1/4x20 bolt or a plastic knob
with a 1/4x20 stud.  The ones from the camera store may be drilled and
tapped so that you can attach it to a tripod and then attach something
to the screw.

-- 
Brian Reynolds                  | "Dee Dee!  Don't touch that button!"
reynolds@xxxxxxxxx              | "Oooh!"
http://www.panix.com/~reynolds  |    -- Dexter and Dee Dee
NAR# 54438                      |       "Dexter's Laboratory"