u/ohmistersunshine

I'm hoping to get some help to develop something which I think would work best in aluminium. I've no experience of metalwork, or STEP files.

My need is this: I am a photographer based in London, currently using two cameras mounted vertically next to each other for stereoscopic photography. I’m using existing camera l-plates for this, which are mounted on the tripod socket using a standard 1/4 thread. The tripod sockets are adjacent to each other.

With the existing mounts, the screws are recessed into the plate which means that they are flush to each other when mounted, but this makes the brackets quite thick - they’re both 10mm thick, which means the distance between mounting plates between cameras totals 20mm.

I’m hoping to find a way of shaving around 15mm off this distance - the stereo distance between the lenses is currently 80mm, and stereoscopic photography works best with lens distance 63-65mm.

I was thinking custom aluminium plates around 2.5 mm thick using flush screws might be a better alternative, if they're strong enough. However, these don’t exist that I can see, so I’m looking for a custom solution.

With a custom solution in mind, I wondered whether it might be possible to create an additional plate which could be added perpendicular to this bracket, to prevent the cameras from rotating at the thread point? They currently have a tendancy to move, and the cameras need to remain in the same position as much as possible. 

Basically, I know what I would like the camera mount to look like, can badly sketch the idea, but I don't know if it's practical, or how to turn it into a CNC machined part.

Are there any services in London which can help with the design and creation of this as a one-off? This is for personal projects, with little commercial value, so it can't be too expensive to develop, but I'd be happy to pay a reasonable amount for it.

Any ideas where I should start?

I also posted this to r/Machinists and r/hobbycnc as I wasn't sure of the best place!

I'm hoping to get some help to develop something which I think would work best in aluminium. I've no experience of metalwork, or STEP files.

My need is this: I am a photographer based in London, currently using two cameras mounted vertically next to each other for stereoscopic photography. I’m using existing camera l-plates for this, which are mounted on the tripod socket using a standard 1/4 thread. The tripod sockets are adjacent to each other.

With the existing mounts, the screws are recessed into the plate which means that they are flush to each other when mounted, but this makes the brackets quite thick - they’re both 10mm thick, which means the distance between mounting plates between cameras totals 20mm.

I’m hoping to find a way of shaving around 15mm off this distance - the stereo distance between the lenses is currently 80mm, and stereoscopic photography works best with lens distance 63-65mm.

I was thinking custom aluminium plates around 2.5 mm thick using flush screws might be a better alternative, if they're strong enough. However, these don’t exist that I can see, so I’m looking for a custom solution.

With a custom solution in mind, I wondered whether it might be possible to create an additional plate which could be added perpendicular to this bracket, to prevent the cameras from rotating at the thread point? They currently have a tendancy to move, and the cameras need to remain in the same position as much as possible. 

Basically, I know what I would like the camera mount to look like, can badly sketch the idea, but I don't know if it's practical, or how to turn it into a CNC machined part.

Are there any services in London which can help with the design and creation of this as a one-off? This is for personal projects, with little commercial value, so it can't be too expensive to develop, but I'd be happy to pay a reasonable amount for it.

Any ideas where I should start?