Ed Moore

Jason - Glad you're okay; sounds like it could have been a whole lot worse. Some good feedback for the rickshaw engineers I feel! My own "nearly" story: I was doing a short a few months ago with loads of action during a rugby match. The "half speed" rehearsals all went fine, got a few takes at full speed etc. Then we decide to just let the rugby players play a bit as they would normally and "see what we get". The front two guys are sprinting towards me and the ball's being passed rapidly down the line... I start running with the rig in front of me panned to me right trying to cross in front of the first guy to pass it as I keep up with the action. With the rig in that position under acceleration is obviously the worst possible situation for unwanted dutch so I'm looking rapidly between the monitor to check level and the incoming rugby players... eventually I reach a point where I can suddenly feel the rig C.o.G. getting out in front of me and I realise I'm going to be pulled down by it... the only thing you can do is try and run faster to "get back underneath it"... I fling my non-operating arm backwards to try and move the rig and I's combined C.o.G. somewhere closer to where my feet are... eventually after 10 sprinting steps in which I'm convinced I'm about to break some bone or other I just about manage to get the whole thing under control. Although I had a spotter in this case he didn't realise what was happening before it was too late - well, possibly he would have done by the time I actually started to tip but thankfully we'll never know. The stills guys managed to catch me setting off at the start of the run here:

That's brilliant Job; I could feel myself wanting to fall over when you pulled out of it :)

If you post a video of your best attempt, we could try and figure out where you're going wrong?

I assume you can get a cable for the Preston that provides run/stop on the standard Canon 8 pin broadcast lens connection? If you take a look here - http://www.jonyjib.com/motion_control.html - you can buy a cable for $100 that adapts the Canon 8 pin standard to the weird Sony connection on the camera itself. Can't remember whether that connection is on the lens (in which case not so helpful for Pro35 use) or body, but it's a useful cable to have as these cameras are everywhere at the moment. I just used one with a Pro35 and it came with an EX3 to B4 mount adaptor that provided a Fuji lens control socket - we had a cable from this to power the Pro35 but assuming you could power that separately I assume a Preston to Fuji run/stop would work there as well. E

Jeff - that link just saved me a massive amount of headache, thanks!

Charles, I absolutely know where you're coming from with that, but you're describing an approach that seems to be totally alien to folk until they have a certain level of experience.

This has actually turned into a great discussion. Rob and Robert - both excellent posts! And Xax, I think offering the RED package for a free hire in return is a great move - plenty of steadicam ops also wanting to shoot their own stuff and this makes a sensible trade. Good luck with your project.

What really annoys me about this stuff is when my friends and I made our first little short film back in 2005, we scrimped and saved for AGES (did the whole "fund a frame", "£50 to become a executive producer" thing until we'd thoroughly pissed off all our extended families) so that we had the proper budget, which included £700 for the steadicam operator we used to do what sounds like a pretty much identical shot. People offer $150 because they think they can get away with it. And I have to say, it doesn't help that the big rental firms (ARRI and Panavision amongst others, I'm looking at you) often do make insane deals on their kit rental which are then used to beat down the steadicam operator ("we're only paying £250 for a complete S16mm package for a weekend, surely the steadicam can't cost more than that!)

Would start with Robin obviously but also try Brian Busby at Bees Engineering on (0)20 8863 5666. Was there the other day and he's got all sorts of bits of arms lying around in various stages of repair.

Hi all, Update - MDR2 with one DM2 attached for focus is quite happy running off camera handle P-tap on F900 series. If I get a chance I'll try it with the other two motors as well.

I've seen Jamie's van and it has m*********g SKULLS on the hubcaps so I think Torbitt may have a run for his money :) That said Jason has probably had his shelved through in titanium lined with baby seal fur or something...

Thanks all for your advice. I'm trying to avoid needing to use the P-tap on the camera's battery mount as that only works with a battery on the back and I need to get as much weight at the bottom of the sled as possible. The rental house has put in a Preston > XLR4, so for this one I think I'm just going to parallel a spare XLR4 female into my sled>XLR4 cable so the one cable can run the camera and the preston.

Wow. To my shame, I've never seen the movie. Will definitely have to pick it up now. I absolutely love the scene through the venetian blinds. Nothing is more exciting to me than when a director has the balls to let a whole scene play in one shot rather than instinctively reach for the usual coverage. It's exhilarating and brings the best out of everyone. Equally it's depressing when the First shouts out "going in for coverage" and the next ninety minutes are entirely predicatable, whatever you're shooting, wherever you're shooting it. Thanks for posting, and much kudos to Lawrence for being involved. Wow (again).

Hi all, Shooting on Tuesday on an F900 and production has rented a Preston (despite the best effort of my ACs, I haven't yet sold a kidney for my own). Just triple checking I can power the receiver properly - ideally we want to power it from the camera as there's much switching from handheld to steadi to be done and the AC and I want to keep the rig together. Are we going to have any problem powering the Preston receiver from the D-tap socket on the F900? Not the one on the battery plate (I'll power the camera off the rig), but the one usually used for a camera top light. I know there's a switch controlling that outlet that sets whether it's on continously or 'auto' - just on when the camera's running, but presuming I set that right (!) is it going to be okay? The AC mentioned something about the Preston liking 24V, but surely it's just as happy with 12V? Many thanks, Preston-savvy dudes. E

Hey Erik, thanks. Jamie and I have been in touch. Cheers!

Hi all, In the market for a second hand magliner located in the UK. Ideally the "Junior" size, or something very similar. Let me know if you've heard of anyone selling one! Cheers.

Just wanted to quickly vouch for Pete's work on this product and his approach in general - he's been working very hard but also very swiftly to get this to market at a sensible price point, and I know he's keen to hear all your feedback and thoughts. Pete did you want to talk about the motor design for the HoFoPro at all?

I've been working on a technological approach to this problem for some time now, and I'd like to demonstrate my results. I can achieve extreme daylight visibility in the harshest of direct sunlight for a bare minimum of cost. Only kidding :) Thanks Charles et al for setting this up; it's a horrible feeling watching your monitor wash out right at a crucial point in a shot and I look forward to the point where I can afford an upgrade to one of the best performers on display here.

Hey Erwin, I actually did a pretty detailed review of Helios (the sun calculator) on my blog at http://emoore.co.uk/blog/production-kit/re...versus-sunpath/ if anyone's interested. Great app, worth the money. As is pCam.

Hi Ken, Ideally yes - although the curve of the archer's lower spar means that many batteries are too high to fit, depending on how far out you need the battery rods for DB. The IDX plate is actually more than adequate (before this new one I had a crappy old Hawk-Woods V lock plate and even that never dropped a battery). In this case I'd just managed to clip the battery coming round a corner and it fell off in front of the RED owner so felt discretion was the better part of valour and made an effort to make it a bit safer.

Hi all, Quick update and some pics. Here's the prototype clamp in use today on a little RED shoot. Makes it much easier to have a shorter post (was crucial today as it was a "walking backwards down a windy narrow staircase" shot and I would have been tripping over a longer post) and the paralleling-in of the second plate into the rig power made a *huge* difference to the time between battery changes, plus when you do you can hot swap them - as long as there's one still attached, the camera stays on. This version is not quite the final shape, isn't anodized, and has a temporary power cable out of it as Peter is still working out the perfect surface mount Lemo to use.

Thanks Ant, I gave Brian a call and he's sorting it out. Cheers!

Finding it irritatingly hard to get hold of the 1/4" and 3/8" Whitworth camera screws in the UK, and the shipping costs from the States are extraordinary! Surely someone's found somewhere that sells them. I've found places that do the longer Manfrotto style but they're all too long to work with our dovetails. Any ideas?

Mike - you really will struggle. And even if you get a build of either camera onto your rig, you will be so limited in configurations (your gimbal will be all the way up and the post telescoped all the way down whatever you do) it'll probably be a bitch to operate. Is it a possibility to get to the camera rental houses first and try to build the rig with the camera as described well before the shoot? It's great news that you've got yourself a feature. Now you need to not blow your reputation on the first one by not anticipating the demands of the camera package. Better to lose out on your margin by having to rent in a larger rig than struggling to operate on every shot.

Got a reply from the DIT: The job was at least a year ago now, so some details are getting sketchy in my memory - I can't remember what lens it was but I think it might have been an Ultraprime, and I guess a 24 or a 32mm judging from how close Bobby was to the camera. It was a rickshaw, pulled by two grips, with a garfield mount plus steadicam, operated by George. I'm not sure if the beginning and end were stabilised, but they didn't need it - I remember there was a tiny bit of very organic, non-distracting movement in the original, so I think they have taken it out. They have done zooming in post on the actual frame during the shot, which ends up being a contrazoom, as the camera is coming further away from Bobby, but they have simultaneously zoomed in on the picture. Watch the background at 1.29 for eg. It's horrible. Again, unnecessary, as they seem to have done that just because they wanted a slightly tighter frame. I think there's another one later, but I don't have time to look for it now. We had one half day for technical rehearsal, then two days shooting for just this one take. I think we did about 30 in all... I'm pretty sure the one they used was the very final take of all three days.