Digiscoping clamp DIY!

The trend towards "Digiscoping" had resulted from two technological developments.

First the development of good roof prism telescopes and binoculars with good eye relief and "walk-in" view - i.e. the user's eye can be anything up to 20mm from the lens. This was to help spectacle users.

Second the development of compact digital cameras. The small size of the light collecting part of the camera and small focal length has allowed cameras such as my Panasonic Lumix FX10 to be made with very good but very small diameter lenses.

Put these two developments together and you can get a camera to peek into a telescope or binocular eyepiece and take good pictures at high magnification.

It is usual to have the camera zoomed-in until the camera is at normal eye strength - i.e. if you had a viewfinder you would see the same size image with the other eye. This is the equivalent of 55mm focal length on a 35mm SLR camera. On my Lumix this is 3x optical zoom. You can take pictures at an un-zoomed setting but the picture will probably be round, or "vignetted" and would need cropping on the computer.

Originally the camera was hand-held against the eyepiece of the scope. As time went on people developed clamps to hold the camera against the eyepiece and to allow the tripod to settle. It is possible to buy various types of bracket, and obviously with so many sizes of scope and camera they need adjustment in 3 dimensions plus adjustable eyepiece clamps.

If you have just one scope and one camera there is no need to spend £30 to £100 on a clamp - you can make one!


You will first need a clamp for the eyepiece. This one is made from a single scrap of 10mm thick steamed beech. The piece is drilled with a large forstner bit slightly SMALLER than the eyepiece diameter, with a couple of additional smaller holes drilled with a 8mm forstner at the place where the clamp will be sawn through. This gives a 4-point clamping grip where the two drillings meet. Two holes 5.5mm diameter are carefully drilled through for the 6mm clamp screws.

The clamp is then sawn in half lengthways and the sawcut planed clean. The top half has the holes opened out to 7mm. The lower half has two 6mm x 10.mm machine screws driven into the 5.5mm holes. The wood is held deep in the vice to prevent splitting the wood and teh screws simply driven in with a drilldriver. I unscrewed the screws and screwed them back in with a spot of woodwork glue on the thread.

When the glue is dry, saw off the heads of the screws and file up the ends, including a small chamfer to allow easy assembly of the two female screws. Wingnuts are perfectly acceptable.

Two short lengths of spring are placed in the gap between the two halves to make the clamp self-opening.


The piece to hold the camera is made from some 5mm perspex. I already had the 1/4 whitworth camera case fixing screw but one can be bought from a camera shop. The perspex is drilled 1/4 whit and the screw fitted into the thread. The screw has a narrow plain section next to the screw so when fully fitted it spins freely, but will not fall out.

Good perspex or acrylic will bandsaw slowly, and clean up very nicely with a block plane finely set.


You need to measure the position of the camera tripod mount in relation to the centre lines of the camera's lens, and make the clamp depth and screw mount positions as close as possible to exact size. You only then needs slots of a minimal length to accommodate measuring errors widthways. Adjustment along the axis of the lens is done by sliding the clamp in and out, and vertically by fitting washers between the perspex and the wood.
The perspex is fitted to the wood by two M4 screws driven into 3.2mm holes, the screws being glued and de-headed in a similar fashion to the larger screws. Nuts and washers with spacing washers for adjustment are then fitted.


Focus the scope on the scene to be photographed. Fit the camera to the clamp, switch on the camera, zoom to the chosen magnification, then fit to the scope.

To take pictures, hold in the shutter release to get the best focus, then release and refocus the scope for best picture in the camera screen, then refocus the camera and take the shot.

It may be better to use a short time delay to avoid shake. On mine this does not always focus properly so my next mod will be to fit a bracket for a cable release!

NOTE: Make sure that the camera can zoom in and out without fouling the eyepiece. Depending on how clever your camera is, it may either shoot back in, or at worst, break the zoom mechanism - You have been warned!




This was taken at RSPB Sandy Sept 2007 with the kit shown in the article. The image shown is full screen uncropped of the feeder station from the main hide.