Pedro Guimaraes SOC

Now that the Go pro HD cams have LCD's on them and live out, we need to take advantage of that and het the folks at GOPRO to make different lenses for them then make an HD rig for the Flyer and pilot rigs!

 

Have you seen this?

 

GoPro 3D pics at Engadget.com.

 

And from the GoPro website...

GoPro showed off thier 3D prototype at last year's NAB....almost a year later and....still no GoPro 3D.

I use the go pro HD alot. It's a great little camera and certainly will allow us to capture some great unique angles and POV's in 3D.

But it's quality is limited and I doubt you will ever see it's use it feature films......maybe for a few frames as a crash cam or something....

Our cast for the day Sara Paxton and David Joel Moore were in good spirits despite the cold weather and I got alot of "...how heavy is that?" questions that day....from them and the rest of the crew.

This actually marks the 3rd 3D project I have done with Joel....

In the next week I will continue to try to come up with a better setup for this combination. I wanna try short primes (lighter!) and different weight setups....I think I can get the overall weight to come down.

Pic of me helping set up the rig that day...You can see the black boxes attached to the lens that make the iris oscillate to achieve the effect that V3 is pioneering.

For more info on the V3 system check out their website....

http://www.inv3.com/index.php/parallax_imaging_technology

So I did my first 3D shoot with the ATOM/Epic combo....

The company that makes the "V3/angeniuex " moving iris lens system apparently helped sponsor the shoot so I was forced to fly with that lens system.

This was unfortunate since the "v3" system adds alot of weight to the lens and also requires a "sync" box and a adjuster box.....this really upped the cables and complexity of the rig....not to mention weight...front weight!

So all in all the overall weight was really high even though we were using the new epic cameras...and a magnesium rig!

To make matters worse it rained alot the night before and we were shooting in a grassy and muddy field. My feet were sinking with every heavy step.

It was very tricky to operate, especially since "as usual" I had a teather of 2 hd-sdi cables to deal with, windy conditions as well on top of everything else.

LOW Mode....was waaay harder than even I expected! It felt sooo heavy! and I had to modify the shots we wanted to do since at the time they had me walking on a sloped surface in low lode!

I'm really going to re-think this setup. I might move some things to the bottom....try to shorten the post....ummmm.

I need to make this better since I just booked a 7 week 3D job with a atom/epic. Luckily we will be using a segway on that job!

hardmount is still the way to go....

Here some pics from the shoot...

During camera setup....you can see all the extra V3 boxes and cables....

my built rig for the day...

Low mode....argh!!

Noise comparison

http://vimeo.com/19709261

Close up of the socket block....

For for this awesome peice of engeneering .....

I'm asking $5995.00

The arm in action and working beautifully with a small (but heavy) 3D rig....

Just Purchased a PRO arm so time has come to sell my trusted Steadicam EFP arm.

Tried and tested design and performance.....best arm you can buy for the money. Has served me well and now it can do the same for you.

Springs will support up to around 55lbs. I have flown canon 5D's to big 3D rigs on it....worked beautifully.

Previous owner (Todd Ferguson who works at Abel Cine LA) said it was serviced before he had stopped operating. It has served me well since.

The usually scratches and one small ding on one of the spring covers....but other than that still looks sexy.

let my pictures do the talking....

Close up of ID tag with serial number.

Closeup of center link and rubber bumpers

Best of all modifications......electric guitar volume knobs on the socket block... :P

These modifications transform this vest, and make for a high quality vest all at the incredibly low price of $2000.00 US.

Please email me at m3pedro@hotmail.com with any questions or offers.

I'm Located in Los Angeles, CA but I'm willing to ship Fedex....

Here's the vest in action....

I just bought a new PRO vest so I'm selling my awesome Modified EFP vest.

As you can see it is far from stock and performs much better than a regular 3A/efp vest. It has all new pads (still have the more used set as backup), all new velcro for hip adjustments and a few key modifications.

***Chest spar buckle installed. Aircraft style (similar design to the one on the PRO)

***left shoulder Bucke installed. Same one as chest spar.

***New pads, velcro and waist support straps (like the ones on the pro vest***

Preping my first Epic/Atom job,

I take some pictures on set this weekend.....

The rig is definatley on the heavy side, "ready to shoot" about 68lbs on the arm. (so...camera/rig/sled/batteries etc..)

The rig and cameras themselves weigh in at 38lbs. So in handheld mode your dealing with about 40lbs. So not so bad.....but Since you need to counter balance all that front heaviness on the steadicam with the balance weight and your post things add up quick.

Using this shoot this weekend as a test since I'm getting ready to operate atom/epic combo for about 8 weeks on a different project. On that one we will make use of a handsfree segway for most of the shooting......

I got it at dinner last night and immediatly though....nigirian scam "engrish" .....

Also thought that was very classy and thoughtful......but to me, the King's Speach just had some amazing steadicam shots and such strong compositions....glad the movie got it's kudos....

Note about some heden motors,

All my heden motors 21's and 26's came with my C-motion Cvolution kit. My FIZ kit is 3D ready so I have 8 motors! I choose to have 6 26's and 2 21's.

I use the 2 21's when I do 2D....but like I said previously they have turned everything I have used them on....

Cmotion sends special boards to heden, they use those boards in all the heden motors they ship to cmotion that they then include in their kits.

Cmotion claims that performance is improved and reliability is better via improved "grounding" of the new boards.

Thus they do charge more for them :rolleyes: and they recommend using thier "heden" version motors with thier equipment but naturally regular hedens and preston motors still work just fine with all the cmotion equipment...

Exception is that with the previous Cmotion receiver you need a special cable to go c-motion to preston motor. The new "cvolution" receiver you can use the same motor cables with the heden motors and preston motors which is great new feature.

I'll see if I can get torque specs from Sebastien from C-motion/Camadeus.... for 21 and 26....

I'm holding off my purchase of wireless HD transmitter system...see if prices come down or there is a clear leader.

Charles, I'm eagerly awaiting your shootout!

yes, when he ran fast there was a significant jitter with every step...not sure what that was all about.....having done a few broadcast gigs I know how tough it can be to deal with unscripted action, non-stop operation and crowds...

....did you see the poor operator get swamped in the crowd frenzy in the victory celebration? I could just see the top of his antenna virating evertime his rig got bumped/smashed into by another photographer/crowd...

his rig took a beating!

Altough I hear that NFL films owns all the rigs...

I think he makes great points in the interview, some things are a bit lost in translation....

"To be a good steadicam operator you must first be a good operator." it's solid advice.

Great news!

The guys over at Element Technica called me to test fly the Neutron Rig with the Scarlets and the new balance compensator today.

I was anxious to test out the compensator unit since it's the first design to execute some ideas I always though would work better than what P+S and Pace are doing.

This compensator unit will attach to the rear of any element technica rig (neutron, pulsar, atom) and allows the stereographer to change IO and convergence during a shot and not upset the balance on your steadicam!

Kudos to Element for listening and coming up with a working prototype that works better than I had imagined! Certainly better than any other rig out there! Watch the video and see for yourself.

Due to precise calibration of the counterweight during the initialization of the system it maintains balance during convergence and during IO changes.

The unit is still a prototype so there are wires hanging out the design is not finalized. We are using the battery as a counter weight and also to possibly power the top camera and access.

The idea of a unit that goes on the back is perfect since we need weight there anyway to counterbalance the front heaviness of the rig.

The test was a complete success! I was amazed there there was virtually no movement at all! I flew the rig while he changed IO+conv. and I can hear the motors and feel something thru my gimbal but little to no movement tilting the camera. There is little torque effect when initiating the movement. They might soften the motor curve a bit to help with that. So there are a few tweaks to be made and improve performance even more.

well see for yourself....watch the video.

Notice....my rig was balanced and on the balance post the whole entire time.

vimeo

youtube

There will be a event held by the Steadicam Guild at HDRentals this sat. here in LA.

(Guild members only)

Paul Taylor will moderate and I will also be on hand to help out pitch in and also demo the new Cmotion Lens control the Cvolution with 8 motor receiver.

I believe the event starts at noon.

located at,

http://www.hdcamerarentals.com/

There will be 3-4 3D rigs to fly and practice with and I'm sure other cool stuff.

That's all the info I have....if you know more post it!

There will be a event held by the Steadicam Guild at HDRentals this sat. here in LA.

(guild members only)

Paul Taylor will moderate and I will also be on hand to help out pitch in and also demo the new Cmotion Lens control the Cvolution with 8 motor receiver.

I believe the event starts at noon.

located at,

http://www.hdcamerarentals.com/

There will be 3-4 3D rigs to fly and practice with and I'm sure other cool stuff.

That's all the info I have....if you know more post it!

There is a new "lower cost" rig out there, around $9,000

Therefore there is a good chance that we might run across this rig on the lower budget shows. The owner brought it by my prep the other day for me to check out.

14lbs. Looks pretty good. Doesn't have pitch control but unless I get a chance to use this rig on an actual job then I will reserve my opinion until I have more experience on it. Naturally you tend to get what you pay for and there is some flex and probably some other issues that might be found once there is more field expirience with this rig. For now it looks intresting.

http://hurricane-rig.com/

The private owner here in LA is awaiting delivery of his Sony F3 cameras, as soon as he get them he said he will meet with me again for a test flight.

Should be a good lower budget package option.

Here's a few pics I snapped.

Convergence and IO plate.

Bottom camera has a roll adjustment.

I was too busy preping a 3D music video that I was operating steadicam on for me to build it out with cameras and test fly it. Too bad since I think it might fly well. I'll find out soon once he gets his new cameras.

i have 2 of them as part of my Cmotion kit. They are much smaller/lighter than the 26's

They are surprisingly powerful. Along with my new cvolution handset I can boost the torque of this motor. So far it has been able to handle all the lenses (no primos yet), I have even used them to move IO and convergence just to see if they will do it....so far so good.

So it's highly recomended.....

there you go,

http://www.steadicamforum.com/index.php?showtopic=13144

just to confirm there is no "genlock" bnc on teh back right? So no 3D use........ (for me) Fail. I work alot in 3D and it's a must.

congrats on the camera.

Next we tested the new feature where you can swap mirror boxes from the bigger Atom?Pulsar! This allows us to use EPICS and PL mount primes on a neutron. I used superspeeds but Ultraprimes would also work.

here is the side by side

Approx. 3lbs heavier only.

Since if you notice the mirror box rods are not even exposed the box is essentially slid all the way in which helps eliminate any flex coming from rods.

With the epics mounted, you can still spin the rig 360 (it's alot closer) but still clears.

If compared to ATOM/Epic combo this should be at least 10lbs. lighter!

**A note about the battery hanging off the back.

As with all beamsplitter steadicam wee need weight back there to counteract the front heaviness of beamsplitters. What you see is essentially a placeholder for the upcoming "balance unit", ajabox(genlock), Downconverter, Modulous transmitter and CAMIN/MDR lens control receiver.

All those items necessary to shoot provide just the perfect weight to restore proper balance. Since I didn't have any of that stuff I used a dionicHC.

It's important to note, if I was prep'in these setups for an actual job there is lots more room for tweaking and improvement.

Here is the video of the Neutron(Pulsar box), Epic, Pl lens combo.

or youtube

After this test and my on set/location experiences with the neutron this year, I'm inclined to say that this is clearly the leading 3D steadicam combination. In terms of regular steadicam operation and stereography. The fact that the ET rigs talk to a Sony MPE for 3D broadcast work(they can control the rigs from the broadcast truck and the Sony software corrects any alignment and lens tracking issues), all the upcoming integration that ET is planning with other vendors regarding metadata and other cool features....well they are clearly leading the field right now.

Thanks to ET, Red and HD Rentals for letting me borrow some lenses.

More RED/3D/steadicam delight,

Joey and guys over at Element Technica were nice enough to invite me back to test fly the 2 new configurations in their lineup. Both of them utilizing the small Neutron rig.

13lbs. bare no cameras. The p+s Freestyle bare weighs 15lbs.

This light weight combined with the lightweight scarlet and mini primes and small heden motors and a new 8-motor Camin (or upcoming ET lens control) result in the lightest and highest resolution 3D rig.

Also the only rig you can spin 360 with your gimbal all the way to the top!

Also the only 3D rig I have been able to dynamic balance! (least of which I can actually spin it on the post!)

truely small and a total game changer when it comes to what we can now do with 3D steadicam. While still shooting beautiful RED 3k images.

Well, see for your self. Here is a quick video I put together.

or youtube

I am very interested in this camera: the Ikonoskop A-cam DII, and the prototype 3D version that they are offering.

The single chip camera is now shipping and I think a very nice HD package could be made with this.

Even with 2 separate cameras the weight issues will nearly disappear.

There might be some adjustment needed on the DATA-side, with 220 mb/sec in Raw it is something to consider.

 

Has anybody more news about this?

It is indeed and interesting camera....haven't seen any here in hollywood yet. Like I mentioned in above posts, the main issue with thier twin lens configuration is the fixed IO. and with PL mounts that fixed IO is probably around 3.5-4" !!! which let me tell you is ALOT.

That really limits the use of that camera and most importantly on a steadicam.

Now 2 of thier 2D camera bodies is an intresting idea. Unfortunatly they chose to make thier camera body "long" which might create some challenges....then again I'm not sure of the measurements.

I would love to try them out! Let us know if you ever get your hands on one.