DIY Camera Slider

Detailed camera shots during review videos have always intrigued me, and I wanted to learn how to shoot them. I decided to make a camera slider as they are useful for making pan shots, however they tend to be expensive. This project was made for Ms. Berbawy's Principals of Engineering class.

Special thanks to Michael Klements from The DIY Life for inspiration for this project.

I printed my 3D parts using the Prusa Mini 3D printer. The supplies for this project were mostly brought from Amazon.

Materials:

1. 2040 Aluminum Extrusion
2. 2040 V-Slot Gantry
3. Camera Ball Joint Mount
4. M5 T Slot Nuts
5. M5 Machine Screws
6. 1/4" Screw Camera Mount
7. Filament: PLA, PETG, Onyx

Tools:

1. 3D Printer
2. Screwdriver
3. Wrench
4. Dial Calipers
5. Hex Driver

1. Use the dial calipers to measure the dimensions of the aluminum extrusion, camera ball joint mount, camera screw mount, and V-slot gantry and recorded them in dimensioned drawings. These dimensions would be used to make the camera adapter and camera legs.
2. I designed the camera adapter and the legs using Autodesk Fusion 360.
3. The camera adapter would hold the 1/4" screw camera mount, as the screw was too large to fit through the M5 screw holes in the gantry. I used the dimensioned sketch of the V-slot gantry to align the M5 screw holes of the adapter and also the dimensions of the screw camera mount for it to fit in.
4. The camera legs would hold the aluminum extrusion up. Use the width of the front face of the aluminum extrusion (20 mm) to fit the legs on the extrusion's width.

1. Place the STL files in Prusa Slicer. I printed the adapter out of PLA and the camera legs out of PETG as PETG was studier than PLA.
2. The camera adapter's print settings did not use supports, and used a triangle fill pattern. The camera leg's print settings was 20% infill, no supports, with a gyroid fill pattern.

1. Slide the V-slot gantry onto the aluminum extrusion (Note: If the gantry does not slide on, use a wrench to turn the eccentric spacer to adjust the wheel spacing of the gantry. Adjust as needed for it to slide on.)
2. Mount the adapter onto the gantry by screwing it on underneath the gantry with M5 screws. (Note: Make sure the screws are screwed enough for the gantry to slide back onto the extrusion)
3. Mount the ball joint mount onto the adapter.

1. Push in the T-slot nuts into the T-slot (Note: Be careful when sliding the T-slot nuts in, as they tend to shift around in the T-slot)
2. Align the legs' holes with the extrusion and screw in it.

1. Here's the video I took using the camera slider. Taking footage on the camera slider takes some time, as I needed to keep a steady hand to prevent shakes. Using a video editor can alleviate this issue.
2. My next steps would be to motorize the camera slider, as this would make taking the footage smoother.