This will use a Pi 4 with 2 steppers to auto zoom a trained model of an rc plane. The Pi 4 and lens will be on one side, while the batteries will be on the other side. Designed to attach to the brim of the hat.
The ideal plan would be to have presets eg. delta, flying wing or standard. You would film your plane and label photos of it for training.
Voice command would also be nice but for now I will go with an OLED display and some tactile buttons for field control.
This will be a long-term project. I just started designing the zooming bit.
This is just a 8-50mm lens so I'm not sure how far away I can zoom, my model airplane has a 1.5m wingspan so it's not small but even a 200mm lens is not enough to zoom in.
This was a quick design and had problems. I overlooked the middle open/close ring being taller than the diameter of the lens barrel. So the telephoto ring gear I had to sand... I also had to sand the front-lens support part. I had to sand it a lot... so it would fit.
Then I had problems with the stepper GPIO's interfering with the camera detection for some reason. If they're plugged (ground connected specifically) on boot, the camera cannot be detected, I don't know why.
So I'll put a switch in for that, I know you could do an electron switch, maybe even a relay but not worth it for me.
Now I can actually do the frame by frame analysis to try and autozoom this thing.
So... I started printing parts and getting rough sizing... I was planning on using some left over MG90D servos... however they only rotate 180 deg (with this pwm code I'm using) and also the gearing cuts it in half... the focus ring rotates the most on the 8-50mm lens. So I have to switch to these steppers that I already have and they are kind of big... oh well. This thing will be chonk.
After this I'll design the camera mount which also supports the lens and the steppers will attach to that.
I will have a programmable unit sometime this week. The software is the hardest part about this project.