[Tim Schultz]

CamRanger sells a motorized tripod head that provides very smooth pan & tilt. They can be driven remotely from an iPad with the CamRanger Wi-fi or also include a cabled joy stick for steering it.
It’s about $230.

I have one that I use for positioning a camera for still photography.
I am new to DSLR video (or any video for that matter) so am still struggling to get sharp focus on a good day. I did some experiments yesterday with rotating a Canon 70D that seemed like they were almost in focus. If I get a chance I will do the same experiment with my Canon MK2.

The motorized head has a slow mode that can run on batteries or AC current. They both rotate pretty slowly. I put a rheostat on the electric feed and was able to get it to rotate even slower. My hunch is that this is exactly what you want, As soon as I can master focus in general I will experiment again and report back.

[Tim Schultz]

Al,

Thanks for all your help.

I have the basics of lighting figured out for still photography. I typically expose for ambient light then add key or fill with small speed lights and modify them as necessary. What I am trying to learn about is lighting for video. While the principles are the same I suspect there are some nuances I need to take into account.

From experimentation I have noticed that video I shoot on my DSLR is a lot more in focus if the ambient light is bright. From this I have deduced that if I add more light to the scene I will get sharper output.

A particular challenge right now is how to light a space when I want to do a 360º pan of the kitchen I built. I need to find a way to light the space but keep the light from showing in the video. I am thinking initially of mounting a small LED on the cold shoe of the camera and then possibly mountain some kind of light on the tripod that aims straight towards the ceiling. I am hopeful that the light bounced off the ceiling will amplify and spill properly to evenly flood the room without producing too many hotspots of light.

Thanks again for your help!