DIY Camera Slider for Content Creation

I have been thinking of ways to up my filming game but I also want to do so on a budget. After doing some research online and seeing how folks made their own camera sliders, I tried it myself.

This project had many failures to get to a usable slider but with a little patience and scrappiness, I came up with this final product. I hope you enjoy and get some good tips out of my mistakes.

Metal electrical Conduit (1/2-inch 10 foot)

Pipe cutter

Conduit holder

PVC piping (3/4-inch)

Epoxy

Motor, I used an asynchronous motor scrapped from an old microwave

Camera holder, I used scrap wood

Stand aka Base, again, I used scrap wood

Pulley mechanism, I am using twine

Sand paper

Felt

Hot glue, if your felt doesn't have a sticky backing

Fasteners, various

Electrical cord (preferably with a switch), I used a cord scrapped from an oscillating fan

Something to keep the cord from slipping, I used a milk bottle cap fastened with a screw

Here is a video of my trial and error to build this slider and the problem solving I learned along the way.

I will preface this Instructable by saying that I use my smart phone as my primary camera. This build isn't truly engineered to hold a DSLR camera, or the like. However, you could adapt this concept to that. If you do, I would love to hear how in the comments.

With that being said, I wound up thinking of a mechanism that reminds me of how CNC roller bearing work. The CNC bearing blocks roll along a polished steel rod. I realized while walking through my hardware store that the 3/4-inch PVC pipe will fit over and "ride" along a 1/2-inch metal electrical conduit since the inner diameter of the PVC is larger than the conduit's outer diameter. Now it was just a matter of making it all work harmoniously.

Side Note: I was going to try and use PVC all the way since it is 4x cheaper than electrical conduit but dismissed that idea since they are way less rigid than using metal. I felt that would make for bad footage if the rail was wobbly.

I cut the 10-foot conduit in half, leaving (2) 5-foot sections(pics 1-3). Next, I took some sand paper to smooth out the metal. Usually the metal conduit has letters/numbers stamped that can cause some areas to be raised.

I cut the PVC pipe in (2) 4-inch pieces and slid those on the conduit to act as the slide (pic 4). I used 2-part epoxy to attach a piece of scrap wood to the top of the PVC pieces and let that dry overnight (pic 5).

TIP: if you leave the stick & leftover mix on the workbench, it will give you a feel of the dryness of your project. If you leave it overnight, it is kind of a moot point but still a good thought if it is cold and/or humid.

With that piece dry, I screwed on 2 other pieces of wood to keep my phone loosely secured from falling over. Kind of like a barrier.

I added some felt pieces (pic 6) to the inside of the PVC so that they would ride smoother on the conduit, attached the (4) 1/2-inch conduit hangers to a couple of pieces of spare blocks (pic -9), and called the slider carriage good.

I tried various DC and AC motors but wound up using a 34 RPM asynchronous motor that I salvaged from an old microwave. This speed is right in a sweet spot that I was looking for. In my testing, I had a 6 RPM motor since those are the more common ones to scrap, in my experience. However, using the 6 RPM one lead me to have to speed up my footage in the final edits.

I secured the motor (pic 1) to one end of the carriage using a piece of scrap wood that was screwed in place (At first I prototyped using a piece of double sided tape and even Velcro but those slipped every time, too flimsy). I then tethered the motor with twine to the cameral slider. I simply stapled it in place under the wood plank holding the camera (as seen in previous step). This acts only in one direction, however. One thing I would like to do is to attach pulleys at both ends so that it may slide in both directions without me having to unwind it every time.

The shaft of the asynchronous motor was plastic and in my experience they generally are. This helped me to drill a hole for the string but also to tap the shaft (pics 2-4). That way I could put a cap on the end to keep the wound twine from slipping, again, making for less than smooth footage.

I did the original (not slipping / smooth) footage by taking the slider and my phone out to my back deck. I quickly learned that footage at a distance does not showcase the intent of my camera slider. . .So I did some nature closeups and found this vastly more appealing.

As it stands right now, I would say this is "bare bones" camera slider. Does it work as intended, heck yeah, but there is a lot of room for improvement. I simply wanted to show my process for a cheap prototype. I am going to end this Instructable here but mention some things I would like to update for future work:

Make a pulley to slide the camera in both directions, as mentioned earlier.

Make the base to conduit fasteners more robust as mine currently tends to twist. It isn't a big deal if it is stationary but set up is a minor inconvenience.

Make a better enclosure for the motor. This is purely aesthetic, however (but one out of recycled HDPE / Polypropylene could be cool).

A more "expensive" option would be to automate it, i.e. using an Arduino or like controller.

Piggybacking off that last one would be to add some sort of Pan/Tilt mechanism (these last 2 I feel may be getting into a "grey area." If you want to go DIY by all means go for it. I am all about making stuff yourself, however, I start to wonder is it really cost effective than just buying a starter slider??)