Thread: same angle different day

i have an idea for a project. for a print i want to shoot stills from precisely the same angle over a period of days or maybe even months.

obviously the camera cant be left in place. i was wondering how to set this up. a triopd wouldn't be much use as it would be too difficult setting it identically over the period.

easiest solution i cab think of is to have a small piece of wood and line a straight edge with the edge of a wall (or something) place the camera on it and draw around the camera base. obviously this would restrict my subject matter, angles etc but i cant think of a more straight forward solution.... Anyone have a suggestion ?

The best idea I can think is to set up the tripod mark the leg points with a spot of paint or similar. Then line up the shot and mark the pan and tilt points on the tripod head so you can line them up every day. If you are using a zoom lens make a not of the zoom position.

This may not be perfect but you could fine tune the position in post using a building. I think that will be as good as using bits of wood etc. Another thought is to some how attach a laser pen to the camera and line it up on a particular spot and adjust the image in post.

These are not perfect solutions but I don't know of a way to do this perfectly without keeping the camera in position.

I wonder if a "theodolite" would be of any use? And wonder whether electronic versions would be accurate enough. For example, here is one which runs on an Apple phone, Architectural Technologist – Theodolite app for the iPhone