RobinThwaites Posted January 23, 2015 Report Share Posted January 23, 2015 Dear Exovest Owners, Firstly a big thank you to all you early adopters of the Exovest, especially for your patience and support. Your feedback has driven important changes that we have integrated into the current design, and we’d now like to offer free upgrades to bring all vests up to that same standard. If you received your Exovest during or after December 2013, and has the scooped-out finger grips on the D shaped portion of the waist over-centre lever, your vest is entirely up to date. If not, there may be some updates available for you. Procedure will be one of the following: 1/ We ship you the upgrade package, including upgrade instructions. All relevant parts will be pre-assembled where possible, so the procedure should take you around an hour to complete, depending on how early your vest is. 2/ You ship it to the Steadicam factory in Burbank, California where we perform the upgrade and return the vest to you, we cover all shipping charges. 3/ You send it to one of our regional partners who will perform the upgrade and return the vest to you, again we pick up the cost of shipping. Should you have a vest in need of an upgrade or just want to check whether you require one, please email Kristi Davis in Burbank at kdavis@tiffen.com or call her directly at 001-818-567-7910. Please have your serial number available and we will verify what needs to be done and explain the procedure. Robin Thwaites Tiffen International 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted January 26, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted January 26, 2015 Here's a photo (thanks Olli Schumann) of the latest version lever that Robin mentions. If your lever looks like this, your vest is entirely up to date. If not, there are upgrades available for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jordan Keslow Posted January 27, 2015 Report Share Posted January 27, 2015 Hey Chris, been meaning to ask you about this. My biggest problem has been not getting the vest to fit tight enough. When I first received it I had to send it back to Tiffen to have the waist straps cut down to allow me to get it snug enough on my hips. After that got settled I started operating but something was still a tad bit off. A few weeks ago i tried something out...I put a booster pad in the front section of the vest to fill in the air gap. Man what a difference! Now it really fits like a glove and allowing me to produce much better lockoffs. Has anyone else tried this? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Sanjay Sami Posted January 27, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted January 27, 2015 Jordan - do you mean to say you put a pad in the chest area ? Its not meant to make contact with your chest. Thats actually one of the things I like best about this vest - the lack of anything squeezing my ribcage. Just as an option, add the booster pad to the shoulder section and try it out. If it works for you then I guess thats fine, but give this a shot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted January 27, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted January 27, 2015 Jordan, That's certainly an original solution, and I'm all for originality, but I'm with Sanjay here. I think you might be better off with that booster pad at the back. Is your vest eligible for upgrades? If so, you might ask Tiffen to shorten the shoulder straps for you as well. All Exovests to date have huge adjustability over the shoulders, and we've never heard of anyone that uses anywhere the largest size (now would be a good time to be contradicted in this), so henceforth, those shoulder straps will all be 1" shorter. When we bring out a compact version of the vest, the shoulder straps will be an additional 1" shorter. So shortening these by 1-2" might be the better solution for you. Are you mechanically minded, or do you know someone that is? Do you have access to a modest machine shop? If so, PM me If you'd like me to take you through what it would take to do this yourself. I can tell you up front, it's no biggie. All the best, Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Jerry Holway Posted January 27, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted January 27, 2015 Jordan- If you can, try just a small bit of some padding at each of the Y chest plate, - it might give you some of the stability that you like without going all across your chest and causing problems. Everybody is a bit different and vests can always be tweaked to better fit the individual operator. I've always customized mine, more or less. Let us know how it goes. Jerry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jordan Keslow Posted January 31, 2015 Report Share Posted January 31, 2015 Chris, Yes I also have a booster pad in the back. The additional pad I put in front gave me a total of 3 pads on the vest. I wish I had known about the compact model : / . After first receiving the vest I sent it back to have the waist straps cut down...now the shoulder straps. But I think shortening them will help snug up the vest. I am still eligible for upgrades but Rey at Tiffen told me there super busy as usual and will get back to me soon. If they can't do it in the next week or so I'll just do it myself. Jerry, Yes good idea! I will try that after shortening the shoulder straps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted January 31, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted January 31, 2015 Jordan, You're not missing anything. The compact version is just the regular version cut down a little on the waist and shoulders, and optionally, though not needed in your case, the length of the rods. You should probably take 2" off your sholder straps. Like I said, it's an easy job as long as you can drill holes in the right places! One advice, do each shoulder strap at a time. I even have difficulty remembering which strap goes where. If you're not 100% sure about doing it yourself, best wait for Rey to book your vest in and have the upgrades done at the same time. Let us know how it goes. All the best, Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Tom Wilkinson Posted February 4, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 4, 2015 Hi Chris, Jerry. I'm loving my Exovest but at the BSC show recently saw that the newer version had more curved / ergonomic pads, which felt more comfortable than my older / squarer pads... I am due the upgrade as my buckle doesn't have the scooped out side sections - are the newer style pads included in the upgrade? tom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted February 5, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 5, 2015 Good question, Tom. Can you please mail me a couple of photos of your pads, plus the serial number of your vest? chris@steadivision.com I'll see what I can do for you. All the best, Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Tom Wilkinson Posted February 6, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 6, 2015 emailing... thanks chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted February 6, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 6, 2015 Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Frederic Sturm Posted February 7, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 7, 2015 Hey Tom, does that also apply to the waist pads? As I (rather narrow waist) have a little issue on the left and right gap, because for me, the waist pads are very close together there and its a bit uncomfortable. I could well imagine more round pads would help that! I have a rather early model, it was the first one delivered to Germany. Thanks for letting me know =) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members chris fawcett Posted February 7, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 7, 2015 Tom, Robin and Dan are going to look at your pads and compare them to the latest versions, but we all think that there isn't any major difference, and if there is, it's not in the design, but perhaps some variation from the vendor. Frederic, If there's something you or Tom don't like about your pads, we'll look at improving them for you. When do you send your vest in for upgrades? All the best, Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Premium Members Frederic Sturm Posted February 9, 2015 Premium Members Report Share Posted February 9, 2015 Hey Chris, thanks that sounds great. I'm not sending it in though, I went for option #1 - don't want my vest gone for weeks with overseas shipping and all. If anyone has a photo of the "new" pads that would be great to compare ours to =) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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