Footwork Practices?

[Ken Nguyen]

I'm with Eric and Kris here.

 

When you walk normally and unaffectedly, you pretty much only use your quads to lift your knees, and an automatic spinal reflex takes care of lifting your foot, so your toes don't drag. When you think too much about any automatic process like walking, you tend to fuck it up. Concentrate instead in moving your frame beautifully though space, and your body will probably work out how to follow.

 

Of entirely anecdotal interest (or not), I spent my first 6 months operating goofy, which suited me fine, except that my walking felt clumsy. When I changed to regular-side, my footwork was instantly better. Retraining my handedness to match operating side was trivial, and took me at most a couple of days.

 

Fly gracefully,

 

Chris

Kris and Eric,

What we posted are exercises to help not just steadicam but for general health as well.

Of cause, we don't walk exactly like that while operating steadicam.

But, yes, when operating steadicam, we walk differently than when we walk without steadicam.

In other word, we don't walk normally while operating steadicam.

 

Ask someone on the set to video you while operate steadicam.

Go home, soak your feet in hot water while sipping martini and watching the "behind the scenes" video.

Do you walk normally while operating steadicam?

Another cup of martini?

 

Chris,

You shouldn't say "walk normally" especially, you are a steadicam instructor.

Have a cup (or 2) of martini and watch this clip: http://steadivision.com/gallery/source/24.html

I might be wrong! This is how you walk normally.

 

I'm having another cup. Cheer!

 

Ken Nguyen.

[Victor Lazaro]

I guess is that Chris and Eric meant not to try to walk in a special way, but rather try to walk as normally as possible. When you go from shoulder camera to steadicam, you sometimes tend to walk in a manner to avoid vibrations. You don't need to do that with the steadicam.

[Juan Lima]

I see 2 different things here.

One is the way you walk and other the path of your feet

 

1. Walk normally and unaffected as Chis, Erik and other experienced op says.

Just keep in mind to take small steps and shift your weight cleanly.

2. Feet go where its easier to you to distribute weight cleanly and where they don't obstruct your maneuvers or the relative position of the post next to your body.

This always helps:

Walk with a purpose.
Organize the Stop.
Anticipate what the Steadicam will do.
Stop with the weight on one foot.

Distribute weight from heel to toe.

Try to avoid as long as you can:

1. Walking sideways (Always walk forward and backwards).
2. Bend your knees
3 Walk with wide open feet (side to side bouncing).

In my opinion 99% of what you need is in the practice of
the switch

[Joe Lindsay]

In addition to good footwork, I've been working a lot on my balance. I've been doing a lot of moving yoga poses to develop a constant state of balance and it's been huge for my operating. I believe you need to understand your body and what proper balance feels like without the rig on in order to achieve constant balance when your center of gravity is pushed out in front of your body.

 

Yoga has also done wonders for my back maintenance. I tend to do some exercises when I get up on a shoot day and when I get home (and sometimes hide on set during lunch and knock out a few stretches).

 

Thought you guys could use something a little more "woo woo" for a change. I'll leave the spirituality out of it for now...

[Mateo Willis]

Slacklining is probably worth trying. Quite a few rock climbers I know do it to fine tune their sense of balance and whole-body posture.