Update Oct 20, 2012: I’m holding this project off. I had a few questions about the pan/tilt speed of the Arduino remote vs the original remote. The pan/tilt speed is reduced, but because we’re changing the original values designed for the motors, it could cause the motors to stall.
We’ve been using the Arduino Uno and Bescor MP-101 for a while now, and I’ve learned a lot, but now I’m ready to develop a Bescor Joystick Remote without the Arduino Uno. If things come together with a little help and support, I want to implement a wireless solution using a smart phone. In the meantime, I want to thank those of you for letting me see your cool pan/tilt projects.
Hi Matt,
How is the joystick devel going? I need to start building a joystick style remote that does a soft start/stop, rather than the hard one it does by default. Think along the lines of having a smooth start/stop when zoomed in to 300mm. I would really like to see your progress.
best,
I really want to start working on it again, but college has kept me busy. Before I stopped, I was looking into programming an ATtiny84 chip and use a ps2 thumb joystick. Unfortunately, the Bescor is not geared for high resolution movement; however, we can try to manipulate the PWM frequency to have greater range, but for 200mm to 300mm zoom, it will be difficult to get smooth start/stop motion.
Hi Matt, Thanks for everything you’ve posted so far regarding the bescor mp101. I am looking to integrate it with DragonFrame and am curious how swappable the nunchuck control may be for this software.
I’ll be digging into it myself (obviously) but as i have limited coding experience figured you might have a minute to elaborate.
either way, thanks again.
http://www.dragonframe.com/moco-3d.php#arduino
I looked at the example sketches, but I would need to see the DFMoco sketch, which appears to be included in the Dragonframe software under /Resources/Arc Motion Control/DFMoco
Might want to check out the joystick controller that is offered by Hague Camera.
http://www.cameragrip.co.uk/acatalog/hague_power_head_joystick.html
I have one, and it allows smooth start and stop. The joystick itself is tiny and does not compare well with something as smooth as the nintendo joystick on the nunchuk, but it gets the job done. At the very least it gives you a benchmark to compare your product against.