Replacement for laser range finder etc for less than £50

Arbistik

I'm not sure how the price translates around the world, but what you are about to find out is how to make your own stereoscopic camera, which will allow you to measure distances, heights, etc form two photos. To get the same accuracy you would need to fork out somewhere between £500 and £2000 for the same thing in laser technology.

All you need are two cheap, fixed lense digital cameras (you can get ones made by Vivitar on the net for about £10 each, a camera flash bracket, and a spare camera nut, which is about £9 on the net, or around £12 from a camera shop. And some image analysis software which you can pick up for around £15. You bolt the cameras side by side on the bracket and have them pointing in the same parallel direction. A bit of gaffa-tape makes sure they dont move about (this is quite critical). Then you point one of the cameras directly at the object you want to know the distance of, or hieght of or whatever. Then you press both shutters at the same time taking two images of the same thing. In one photo the object be in the middle of the picture in the other it will be off-set to either the left or right depending on which camera you center the image on, then amount of off-set is proportional to the distance the object is from the camera. Now you do need the image analysis software to measure the amount of off-set and also at the very start you need to calibrate it with a known distance.

Enjoy