Preparatory Steps - NOVOFLEX VR-System III Manual

Safety Pin
Panorama=Q 48
Backside of Castel=Q
One of four milling grooves
to catch the savety pin
View from above:
Castel=Q mounted on Panorama=Q 48
Castel=Q turned around 180°:
Tip:
Start with Assembly A and try to find out the nodal points of all your lenses (see next chapter). If you have difficulties
due to a too short adjustment distance (which depends on your lenses), I recommend to switch to Assembly B.

Preparatory Steps:

Finding the nodal point:
The position of the nodal point is dependent
on the camera-lens-combination and - when
using a zoom lens - on the focal length you
use. Therefore you should try to find the posi-
tion of the nodal point of all lenses that you
will use and write them down. When taking
the pictures later, you only have to transfer
the value to the focusing rack, before
you start shooting.
Locking Screw The panning base Panorama=Q 48 (see fig. on the left) is equipped with a
safety pin, that prevents, together with four according milling grooves on the
backside of the focusing rack Castel=Q inadvertent dropping of the equipment
when the locking screw is not completely closed by mistake. This security me-
chanism can also be used for reproducible positioning of the focusing rack on
the panning base.
Assembly A
Assembly B
Mount the focusing rack centrically on the panning base and tigh-
ten the locking screw of the Panorama=Q 48 at first firmly.
Now open the locking screw again around a half-turn and shift
the focusing rack in one direction until it is stopped by the safety
pin, grabbing exactly into one milling groove. Now the focusing
rack can't be moved anymore. At last tighten the locking screw
completely.
If you don't want to use this mechanism for positioning of the fo-
cusing rack on the panning base (e.g. because you need a longer
adjustment distance along the optical axis) you should mark the
corresponding position e.g. with a waterproofed pen on the pan-
ning base.
There are two ways to mount the focusing rack on the panning
base (each time turned around 180°):
When using Assembly A the screw for the angle bracket (1) is
quick and comfortable accessible from behind. This is the most
usual way to mount the focusing rack on the panning base.
When using Assembly B, access to the screw for the angle bra-
cket (1) is not so comfortable, because when having installed a
camera the screw is located underneath the lens. But now you
have a longer adjustment distance along the optical axis, which is
important when using standard zooms with fast maximum aperture
and large lens barrels.
Preparatory step 1:
Assemble all components of your
system, beginning from the top
down:
• Spirit level on the flash shoe
• Camera with lens
• Angle bracket Q=Plate Vertikal
• Focusing rack Castel-Q
• Panning base Panorama=Q 48
• Tripod head
• Tripod