Peter Abraham

When you laugh with delight after 60 seconds and keep smiling through an entire shot of this length, it's a testament to operational skill and just plain fun. Nicely done !!! Peter Abraham

Good morning ! Gentle reminder that the Steadicam Open House is happening this Friday. This event is being co-hosted by Doug Macaulay at Kingsway and Yen Peng of CinequipWhite. The Tiffen Company is bringing most of the systems up. Featured will be the premiere Ultra 2, the Archer 2 with unique fold-up sled design, the Flyer LE and Steadicam Pilot. Come and join us for a day of hands-on testing, flying and exploring ! We all look forward to seeing everyone there this Friday from 10 am to 4 pm at the CinequipWhite store at 1040 Islington Avenue Toronto ON M8Z 6A4. I will be there all day to demonstrate the systems, answer questions and help you make the most of the time with our Steadicam rigs. Best to everyone, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam® The Tiffen Company 90 Oser Avenue Hauppauge, New York 11788 ](917) 453-1219 pabraham@tiffen.com

The Tiffen Company is please to announce that we are bringing our Steadicam Workshop to Austin Texas for the very first time. The dates are as follows: July 17-18, 2010 Hosted by Omega Broadcast Group 817 West Howard Lane Austin, Texas 78753. Tuition is $ 500.00, prepaid at time of registration. This group is limited to 9 students. For registration information please visit our Steadicam Workshops Web Site. Any questions or comments regarding the program or Steadicam systems in general, please do contact me. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services / Workshops Coordinator Steadicam® The Tiffen Company 90 Oser Ave Hauppauge NY 11788 917-453-1219 pabraham@tiffen.com www.tiffen.com

The Tiffen Company is please to announce that we are bringing our Workshops back to the Tampa area. Last year's event sold out and was a huge success, with a tricky test shot and some superb BBQ at the wrap party. ( Who knew we could get such amazing BBQ in Tampa?? ) The dates are as follows: July 10 – 11, 2010 Hosted by Encore Broadcast Solutions. 2104 West Kennedy Boulevard Tampa, FL 33606-1535. Tuition is $ 500.00, prepaid at time of registration. This group is limited to 9 students. For registration information please visit our Steadicam Workshops Web Site. Any questions or comments regarding the program or Steadicam systems in general, please do contact me. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services / Workshops Coordinator Steadicam® The Tiffen Company 90 Oser Ave Hauppauge NY 11788 917-453-1219 pabraham@tiffen.com www.tiffen.com

Evening ! Just a reminder- please email me to let me know if you are coming up to the Lake Arrowhead Classic Workshop to visit for Operator's Night. Need a head count for dinner, come and be our guest. We've already heard from a group of our Steadicam Operators and are glad to welcome all comers. Come at 3pm or later, and stay through dinner into the evening. Great group here, Jerry and Garrett and the instructors are having a blast. Special treat for those staying into the evening !! Best, Peter Abraham pabraham@tiffen.com Hope to see many of you up here.

Lake Arrowhead Classic Steadicam Workshop Operators' Night The Tiffen Company is pleased to invite all Steadicam Operators to the Operators' Night at our 4th annual Lake Arrowhead Classic Workshop. We will be east of Los Angeles up in the San Gabriel's for a week at the UCLA Lake Arrowhead Conference Center. On Tuesday, March 23rd, we invite one and all to come up to join us. Arrive at 3pm or later, and please stay to be our guest for dinner and into the evening. Feel free to bring your kit to show the students. In the past, folks have brought their set carts, specialized accessories and custom-crafted bits. If you wish to stay the night, you may make your own arrangements by contacting the conference center directly at 909-337-2478. Join Jerry Holway, Garrett Brown and the host of Instructors and students for an afternoon and evening of socializing and Steadicam sharing. Please RSVP to me if you can make it as we do need an accurate head count for dinner. Best to all, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam Workshops Coordinator pabraham@tiffen.com

This workshop has been canceled. Please regard the newly scheduled workshop at CinequipWhite Toronto being held on May 1 & 2, 2010. Best to all, Peter Abraham

We are pleased to announce that Tiffen and CinequipWhite Toronto are holding a Steadicam Flyer / Pilot Workshop. It will be the weekend of May 1 &2, 2010. The address is 1040 Islington Avenue, Etobicoke, ON M8Z 6A4, Canada . To register, visit our Steadicam Workshops Web Site . Group limited to 9 students. Tuition for this workshop is $ 500.00 USD, prepaid at the time of registration. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam Workshops Coordinator The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com 917-453-1219

Tom, You put a lot of professionalism and thought into this reply. Please stop by our booth at NAB if you are attending this year. I see you're in Vegas but that doesn't mean you'll attend. I would be delighted to return the gesture you've made here and spend some time with you with some of our rigs. Anyone who regards our efforts with the respect and time you've shown is to be thanked and applauded. So, as a former Steadicam Operator and now Instructor, I thank you for your critique. Good stuff. Good reel too !!!! Peter Abraham Dir. of Technical Services, Steadicam ® The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com

We are pleased to announce that Tiffen and CinequipWhite Toronto are holding a Steadicam Flyer / Pilot Workshop. It will be the weekend of February 27 & 28, 2010. The address is 1040 Islington Avenue, Etobicoke, ON M8Z 6A4, Canada . To register, visit our Steadicam Workshops Web Site . Group limited to 9 students. Tuition for this workshop is $ 500.00 USD, prepaid at the time of registration. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam Workshops Coordinator The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com 917-453-1219

If not, I know that Oliver at TCS in NYC has / had a Flyer for rent. He's at 212- 247-6517. It was a Flyer with a 5-15 pound payload range, though that was for sale and he may yet have brought in a new LE to replace it. Give him a try ! Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com

Erwin. Email me. I have a box to send to you and I have no idea where to send it. In other news, today is February 4th - the 12 billionth anniversary of the invention of Titanium. You pick up your rig today, have a little celebratory moment with your arm !!! :) Peter Abraham pabraham@tiffen.com

Congrats, Martin ! A bit of a trial by fire, eh? Just as it should be. A smooth and stress-free first gig with a Steadicam is almost......unnerving. Glad to hear that the sole after-effects was a bit of lactic acid there in the lower back. Sounds as though you worked to keep good form. Well done. Stay in touch and welcome to the most incredible community of artists and technicians. Best, Peter Abraham

Paul Thank you for the clarification on the issues you're facing. I'd say tiny steps. Isolated steps one at a time are mercilessly difficult. Smaller steps in a rhythm may pay off for you. Best, Peter Abraham

Not so little. This is quite key. The rig absorbs 1 cycle per second up to hundreds of not thousands per second perfectly well. But doing a shot that is paced as step..........step..........step..........step.......... is beyond complex. MUCH more efficient use of the tool to do a walk that slowly by doing this: stepstepstepstepstepstepstepstepstepstepstep in little precise mincing steps. That way you, your torso and hips and vest and arm and rig and career, are always in motion, in a smooth flow. Peter

I'd no idea your girlfriend was a Director ! Three year old thread, good thing to revive from Zombie Status. Rob's comments on live tv being a different animal are so very true. In that world, you have a voice ( voices.... ) in your head telling you where to go and what to shoot and WHEN to move and stop. We simply learn to move with those voices. Having the rig physically touched? Do what Charles does. The biggest thing to tell a new director or young director is that they must find a way to be brutally honest with their Steadicam Operator. Did they hire someone well suited? They likely did NOT hire you, a Producer did. ( Or coordinator or PA or or or.... ). Can you execute the shot, through 11 takes, bringing good stuff to every take, + the coverage? They need to know you can do that at the very least. Pleasing a Director is sometimes quite tough, but if they truly feel you're on their side and want the story to be told their way, and you will guide the frame as they envision it ( and hopefully can communicate it ), all will be well. Mostly. :) Peter Abraham

Hi Paul, Excellent question. Here is the cause for the horizontal roll and a few solutions. Since we (almost) all set our rigs to be bottom-heavy to one degree or another, the rigs are in essence a pendulum. They behave as such when accelerated through space. When walking forwards in the Missionary, we compensate for the pendular effect with placement of pinkie or fingers when starting and stopping. When facing sideways in the much-beloved Tango position ( This is where the rig is facing 90 degrees off axis of the direction you are walking ), the pendular effect becomes apparent when the horizon rolls to and fro. This is because you are pointing the lens to the left, but walking forwards. The gimbal that the centerpost is riding in does not care in which direction you have the lens pointed. It isolates evenly in all axis. When you start to walk forwards, the centerpost rolls as it should within the gimbal. The way to compensate for the roll that in Tango appears as a horizon problem is to place your fingers directly opposite the direction of the roll. So, if you are facing forward and the lens is facing to the left of your body and you start to walk forwards, the camera will tilt away from you as you being to walk and the area of post just below the gimbal will tip towards you. The way to stop this is to place your left pinkie ( which is currently on the far side of the post ) around behind the post, so that if the lens were delineating " 12 noon" on a clock dial and the battery were " 6 o'clock" on a clock dial, you would want your pinkie to be at 9 o'clock. This prevents the centerpost from tipping in this axis as you accelerate. What happens when you slow down? The opposite effect. However, if you are shooting to the left and your left hand is used to operate the centerpost, your 4 fingers are already resting roughly at the 3 o'clock position on the centerpost. Simply hold them there and prevent the post from tipping away from you. ( as you come to rest, the camera would be inclined to tip towards you and the area of post just below the gimbal would push out away from you- right into your waiting fingertips ). Hope this is helpful. The amount the camera deflects from vertical is directly linked to the drop time you use. The more bottom-heavy a rig is ( faster drop time ), the harder the camera deflects out of true when accelerated, decelerated and moved around a turn. The slower the drop time, or less bottom-heavy, the easier the camera pushes out of true. Because your fingers are resting AT the C.G. as you operate, they will only work slightly easier or harder to stop the pendular effect whether it is quite bottom-heavy or barely bottom-heavy. In Previewing, one additional thought. The business of " moved around a turn " deserves some attention. When turning around a corner or negotiating a turn while hard-mounted, the G forces on the rig may be considerable and it takes a bit of practice to learn exactly what to do with your post hand in order to compensate precisely for the roll. If you are taking a turn quickly, the centerpost wants to proscribe an arc beneath your fingers, not just deflect out of true. When you've taken the workshop, any good workshop, and have been shown the techniques, make sure you do practice them. This should include taking turns around corners fairly quickly. The rig feels different against your fingers when the masses are in a rotational path than they do when they are deflecting in a straight line ( as is the case when you start or stop moving in a straight line ). Muscle memory is your friend ! Practice these turns so your hand "knows" what to do. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam The Tiffen Company. ( 23 years as an Operator )

Brian makes an excellent point. Using the book spec for a camera weight to use as a point of reference for buying a rig may be misleading. The entire payload needs to be addressed. A partial list of items that are frequently used along with a camera body. ( List applies to 4 pound cameras as much as larger systems ). Riser plate/ rods for mattebox and / or follow focus and / or ring light. Follow focus motor and bracket. Wireless receiver. Hard drive. Clip on mattebox. 35mm lens adaptor kit ( Letus, RedRock Micro, PS+Technic, etc ). Extended life battery. Build the system you are going to work with. Weigh it accurately. Then decide which system affords you what you need. Peter Abraham Dir. of Technical Services / Steadicam The Tiffen Company Former Steadicam Operator

The exact location helps!! The Eastern Classic Steadicam Workshop is being held at: Historic Banning Mills 205 Horseshoe Dam Road Whitesburg GA 30185 (770) 834-9149 Best Peter Abraham

Tiffen is pleased to invite all who can make it down to the Eastern Classic Steadicam Workshop Operators' Night. We will be opening up the workshop to our guests after 4:30pm on Thursday, December 10th. We encourage folks to stop in, have dinner with us and meet the students and instructors ! We are holding the infamous Grand Prix shot for the students to take during the day on Thursday, and those of you who've taken a workshop know how intensive that is. So come in later in the day, bring any gear you wish to show to students, bits from the kits and such. We will be happy to see you. Please do RSVP to me in the next few days if possible so that we have a good head count for dinner. Hope to see many of you there !! Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam® The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com 917-453-12129

Yes. Yes it is. :D

Good afternoon, Tiffen is pleased to announce that Abel Cinetech in Burbank CA is hosting one of our 2-Day Flyer / Pilot Steadicam Workshops. The dates of the workshop are January 23 & 24, 2010. This class is limited to 9 students. Tuition is $ 500.00 per student. For all Registration and full detailed information on the workshop program, syllabus, basic schedule and so on, please visit our workshops web site. Steadicam Workshops Web Site For questions regarding our workshops and Steadicam sales, please call or email me. Best to all, Peter Abraham pabraham@tiffen.com

Famous story of the Op on "Far And Away" doing vehicle mount shot of the huge land rush sequence. ATV mounted rig. It hit a depression in the ground while moving at a high rate of speed and the arm bounded upwards, coming to top of boom and locking. The sled went flying. Wrecked the sled, wrecked the 65mm Panavision body and lens and mag. I fell a few times while operating. The former MSNBC studios in Secaucus, NJ were a patchwork of aluminum diamondplate walls, stairs and platforms. All of the platforms had overhang tops to them. That is, the sides were recessed about a foot in from the platform surface, leaving a 1/4" sharp edge of diamondplate. Tracking behind a very young Brian Williams, I quickly stepped upwards onto a platform behind him. Having misjudged the height of said platform, my shin slammed into the edge of the metal. ( Yes. Wince. The blood was copious, the pain memorable ). Falling over onto the 12-14" high platform, I fell over. The sled feet ( MS Elite ) hit the platform and due to the upwards pressure on the sled and the angle of my fall, the sled came off of the arm and fell. It happens. Just not often. Might I add, in the heat of battle at the end of a long walk, there's a neat trick for removing the sled from the arm without a stand being nearby ( Said stand being back "at 1" ). Instead of having a grip or a.c. pull up while you bow down, just lift a knee, rest the sled on your thigh and lean into it just slightly. Do so WHILE the a.c. or grip is holding the centerpost. The gimbal/ handle will disengage off of the arm post without the nice person who is willing to schlep the sled back having to pull the rig high up in the air to clear the arm boom. Best, Peter Abraham Director of Technical Services, Steadicam® The Tiffen Company pabraham@tiffen.com

I understand. As of now, I have no Workshops scheduled for April. We have our Lake Arrowhead Classic in March. However, in the coming months, I will be announcing that part of our schedule. By all means, it would be a pleasure to have you attend one of our 2 Day Flyer/ Pilot Workshops ! Best, Peter Abraham

Good afternoon Nelson, Not sure what you mean. "But I doubt desicion making a purchase when they have programming workshops in the month of April 2010?" ??? Right now I do not have the schedule set into April 2010. I run 1-2 workshops a month all over the United States and Canada. We use the state of the art Flyer LE and Pilot rigs in the 2 Day Workshops. Garrett does not attend the 2 Day Flyer/ Pilot Workshops as a rule, but if I'm running one in LA and he happens to be in town, he does try to stop in. He has been with us for the Eastern Classic and Lake Arrowhead Workshops recently. Tampa was a good weekend ! You'll have to talk to someone who attended for a more objective response. :) Everyone worked very hard, we smiled and made good shots, learned a lot about technique and aesthetics. Best, Peter