Hello Panoheads,

I am Don French and I signed up for this list when I read about your
upcoming event in Toronto. I had hoped that I could make it there to
meet some other panoheads and to get some feedback on my new motorized
pano machine. I don't think that I will be able to make it to Toronto
as it turns out but maybe one or more of you might be interested in
getting a beta version of my machine prior to the meetup.

I went to the amazing xRez Yosemite shoot last weekend and brought my
machine with me. I can hardly express how great that experience was.
There were 20 teams, all of which were provided with a Gigapan to
shoot a panorama of a section of the valley at 1 PM on Saturday.
About 50 people participated all together. We mostly all camped
together in a group camp in Yosemite Valley and so everyone pretty
much got to meet and talk with everyone else. xRez provided a great
catered meal on Saturday night and everyone sat around the great
campfire and consumed beverages afterwards and had a great time.
Amazing people and amazing synergy! It was also a great opportunity
for me to show off my gadget and I got an amazingly positive response
from everyone who saw it.

So a little more about the gadget. It is called AutoMate and I
started a company called The Gadget Works that is now preparing to
make and sell them. When I demonstrated my machine to the people who
had just returned from using the Gigapan to shoot their panos, the
almost universal response was, Wow! That is what the Gigapan should
be. So this made me very pleased of course. Here are the things that
they said that they preferred about AutoMate over the Gigapan.

It can handle a DSLR and a long lens (I demonstrated it with my
biggest lens, a 400 mm), whereas the Gigapan can only handle a point
and shoot. It is very compact and light (2 pounds including
batteries). Most of the people had hiked up a mountain and back down
to get their shoots, so this was a biggie. It is stable as a rock.
The Gigapan did not do well in the wind, apparently. I guess it kind
of blows around. AutoMate doesn't have fragile mechanical parts
sticking out to get caught on stuff. The Gigapan has a shutter
plunger mechanism that is easily bent or broken and it sticks out.
AutoMate is much, much easier to set up and get running. It has
presets for everything that you can save and reload, and it remembers
the last settings you used so most of the time there is nothing much
to do except point the camera and start shooting. AutoMate has a LOT
of extra features that aren't on the Gigapan, like the intervalometer
and self-timer and custom programs and event sensors and external
device control.

My web site (www.thegadgetworks.com) has more information, but I just
started building the site, so there aren't even any photos of the
machine yet. This will change soon. Videos coming too, and screen
shots of the UI! Anyway, you can apply to be a beta tester by
clicking the link at the bottom of the Products page. I am doing it
like the Gigapan people did, and charging a reduced price in exchange
for getting beta testing feedback. I haven't set the retail price
yet, but it will be more than the Gigapan and much less than anything
else on the market. I am thinking maybe $699 retail and $499 for the
beta. Let me know if you think that sounds about right.

Also, if anyone knows a Gigapan beta tester, I would like to talk to
them. Please have them get in touch with me. Thanks!

Don