Interesting new rig

[Charles Papert]

 

 

[Charles Papert]

closer look at the hardware

[Evrim KAYA]

WOW! not bad at all.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=768h3Tz4Qik

[Mariano Costa]

15000 Dollars - love this thing but should tire your arms very quickly...

[Joe Lawry]

Yea, 20 pound version coming.. have fun running around with an alexa like that. Sales of Bartech's are going to go through the roof.

 

Very interesting though..

[Daniel Stilling DFF]

The one aspect I don't like of this is the 2 operator thing. It will invariably be always behind a little bit as one operator catches up with what the other operator is thinking and doing. If they implement a way to give all the control to the guy that's carrying it, then there's no stoping this...

Bartech and Easy Rig are going to love this!

[Thomas English]

All I can say watching that is.... better learn to rollerblade.

 

http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2013/04/04/movi-a-revolutionary-handheld-stabilized-system-takes-flight/

 

Anyway.. what happens when you put it on the end of an arm? Like the klassen fixture.

 

We always have a DoP on set twiddling his fingers. He'll want to operate.

 

Yeah there is no doubt this is going to be chipping away at a lot of Steadicam work. Do you buy one?

 

I do see issues:

 

takes a while to setup

very heavy lenses push the camera backwards

seems jerky on the 24mm ish lenses used in this movie. How is it going to be on the industry standard 35mm lenses.

will it work in the rain? are the motors strong enough for all the plastic

 

It has gone in my mind to being this incredible rig that can do anything to a very niche rig that is very good at certain shots. The shots we don't want to do on Steadicam anyway. All my DoP's will still want to do stuff gently and in a considered manner on the correct tools. Still.. this thing is going to be awesome for action movies!

 

.. better learn to rollerblade

[Lars Erik]

Cool device. But some of the pans are too choppy for my taste.

 

It does look tiresome after a days work though. Not sure how long a operator would be able to shoot with an Alexa.

 

But I'm sure we'll see this device on several productions in the future.

[RonBaldwin]

Good point Thomas about putting it on a steadicam arm (Atlas sales just went up!)

[Mark Baluk]

 

At around 2:35, the camera op is running on a bit of a diagonal. You can see this wierd thing happen where it seems the camera response is a bit delayed, it seems to go off a tiny bit, then correct back to it original frame, then go off, then correct, then off , then correct.

 

Granted it's new tech, but it looks like it still needs some kinks worked out. It seems to produce this wierd mechanical look to the movement.

 

But some of the stuff looks great too!

[David Hughes]

All I can say watching that is.... better learn to rollerblade.

 

http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2013/04/04/movi-a-revolutionary-handheld-stabilized-system-takes-flight/

 

Anyway.. what happens when you put it on the end of an arm? Like the klassen fixture.

 

We always have a DoP on set twiddling his fingers. He'll want to operate.

 

Yeah there is no doubt this is going to be chipping away at a lot of Steadicam work. Do you buy one?

 

I do see issues:

 

takes a while to setup

very heavy lenses push the camera backwards

seems jerky on the 24mm ish lenses used in this movie. How is it going to be on the industry standard 35mm lenses.

will it work in the rain? are the motors strong enough for all the plastic

 

It has gone in my mind to being this incredible rig that can do anything to a very niche rig that is very good at certain shots. The shots we don't want to do on Steadicam anyway. All my DoP's will still want to do stuff gently and in a considered manner on the correct tools. Still.. this thing is going to be awesome for action movies!

 

.. better learn to rollerblade

I have used my skates a few times with cameras over the years and this is exactly what you would need to do it properly. Without it horizons are all over the place. Hanging on to the back of taxis is how i used to get up hills and I can assure you in London traffic it isn't for the feint hearted. There aren't many situations where rolerblading is practical the surface must be smooth, you must have safe runoff areas if you need to bail and a slight downhill incline helps a lot. But this does open up a whole new set of possibilities where skates will be the appropriate way to do things.

The way the camera is held in the rig looks similar to the original alien design by Lyn, the camera is held from underneath with the horizon servo directly behind the camera and not in rings as per the AR. This should adapt quite easily to our everyday sleds to get AR like shots at least with smaller cameras. Of course Howards ring design will probably still be needed for full body Alexas and heavier stuff. Perhaps something similar to this is what MKV has in the pipeline for the future.

 

Its one thing to put a camera on your shoulder to go handheld but entirely different to be holding 20-30 pounds at arms length for extended periods of time take after take. You would need to have back muscles as strong as a steadicam operator anyway and biceps like Stalone. Should be perfect with a scaled down Epic.

 

Thomas I can teach you to skate if have a few hours free.

Dave.

 

[David Hughes]

Thomas what is a Klassen Fixture?

[JamieSilverstein]

I'm not sure that you get the point. It's not built for an Alexa, it's designed to work with a Canon 5d/7d or just maybe a 300/500.

In my opinion, it's a very cool device and despite all of the criticism that has been levied here, is something that we have to carefully look at and possibly embrace.

Here is the new reality, at least where I sit in the episodic world. Producers want more for less and they want it faster and easier. The 5/7d world is rapidly becoming a stable part of our everyday work load not to mention GoPros.

I don't necessairly like the evolution of the camera world, but I don't write the rules. Not many of us do.

I think there is still life left in the world of conventional image making, using large cameras to make a narrative, but I know that the smaller cameras and all of the devices being created to make them do things that the Alexas and Panavisions Golds used to do are the future. Get used to it and start to make it work for you so that you can continue to keep working.

[David Hughes]

To quote from their website

 

"The first unit that is being released – the M10 – supports a camera up 10 pounds with accessories. That equates to a DSLR with a lot of accessories or a bare Epic and prime lens. We’ve been using the Epic and the Canon primes and Zeiss CP.2 lenses all week on a commercial without a hitch. A future version the M20 is slated to support an Alexa or Epic package w/ zoom, price and date TBD."

 

http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/2013/04/04/movi-a-revolutionary-handheld-stabilized-system-takes-flight/

 

I assume that the M20 is for a 20 pound payload. I don't think that there will be a big market for this at least without an Easy rig or Klassen suspender, and I'm sure I'm not alone in hating that method.

[Charles Papert]

Perhaps instead of a suspender/Easy rig arrangement, something like the three section arm that was demoed with the Exovest would be a good fit for this. As much boom range as ones arms can manage should cover a lot of shots, and then you can just go to the handheld version for ones that don't. I think this would be imperative to allow a self-operated version to be successful, as it would be too challenging to be able to make the minute controlled movements required while holding all that up in front of you.

 

I've believed for a while that the future was automatic axial stabilization right in the camera via processing (something along the lines of OIS, or real-time Smoothcam) but the spatial stabilization would still require help via a Steadicam-style arm. This rig proves that it's not imperative, but in real-life applications, with a longer shot than the ones seen here it would benefit from a little assistance.