thinking of buying this set-up or a slightly used Glidecam V-8. anybody have an educated opinion on which way I should go? prices are comparable and neither has a monitor so I would have to buy it. I have to make up my mind soon, shooting starts in 5 weeks! thanks

I'd go with the Magiqcam as being as good or better. But it takes about 4 weeks to get one as they only build 'em after you order. You'd have to contact the company to find out if it would work out with your shooting schedule. Can you postpone shooting? Keep in mind, too, that you'll probably need some time to learn how to operate the rig to get the shots you want.

Very solid advice from Dave, and seconded. Buying the gear is the "easy" part. Plan to set aside a good 20 hours of practice time to get the feel of the system, so that you aren't having to learn on the job, which has resulted in more than a few of these type of units going up for sale not long after purchase.

thanks guys. I will be ordering it tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Just curious Dave and Charles, why you would choose the Magiqcam over the Glidecam V-8?

hi patric,
any comment on how the magiqcam system works? i'm considering buying one too but just need some words of encoragement.
thanks.

ed

In that the Magiqcam is somewhat reverse engineered from a Glidecam, they are similar units; but the Magiqcam is less expensive, and that is a major factor for most of the readers of this forum.

Well, I don't know if these are words of encouragement or not: I just ordered my Magiqcam IIa. I looked at the various options and it just seems the best bang for the buck, under $2k. After reading through all of Charles Papert's posts I also took his opinion of it to heart.

The emails I have sent back and fourth between John Gardner have been very informative. I am waiting until I get the unit before deciding on monitor. I might be able to get a Varizoom 5" LCD from a friend, but I am also looking at some 7" 16:9 TFT LCDs for right at $200. I will probably have to hood them well for shooting outside, but you can't have everything for a Steadicam under $2k.

Charles, I am getting the Magiqcam to use in shooting a film next spring. Are there any good books or videos on technique that you would recommend? I know I will need to work with it all winter to be in the shape I want to be for long shooting days next spring. I figure that the $1650 a Magiqcam is just like buying a high class piece of exercise equipment, that happens to help with video. :)

the turnaround time for a Magiqcam is 3 - 4 weeks. They are made to order. So I am still waiting on mine. I did get to play around with a Steadicam last week and one thing is for certain. SIT-UPS!!!! LOTS AND LOTS OF SIT-UPS! If I am going to use this I have got to have a strong back. A strong stomach is needed to support the back. .. So fellas, GIVE ME 25!!!!

Keep at it, E.! Another great exercise if you guys are gym-goers is the Roman chair. It really targets those lower back muscles that are worked hard by Steadicam. The back extension machine is good.

Joe, there aren't any real instructional materials out there...yet. I'm prepping just that thing, hopefully it will be released in time for you to make use of it before your shoot.

If you can find (on eBay or somewhere) the "EFP Instructional Video" that was done by Jerry Holway about 10 years ago, that would give you some good pointers.

Thanks Charles, I'll keep an eye out for it. I think I have been reading some of his stuff recently. Yeah, that was the guy. He has a good primer on dynamic balance:
http://www.holwayfilms.com/manuals.shtml

Those Ultra docs are making me drool, though.

Joe. the name of the guy is Jerry Holway. He's done many instructional videos and is a brilliant steadicam operator, like Charles Papert himself.

Yeah, I didn't restate Jerry Holway's name from the post right above me, from Charles. :)

I've been trying to use mine for a few months, and have had some setbacks, but I'm curious, since there is not a plethora of information.

How are people balancing their Magiqcam riggs, Batteries, Monitors, the heaviest anyone has been able to balance their rig, and has anybody got a hard mount solution?

S_

I just got mine today. I balanced it, but ended up taking everything off but the MA 100 and a wireless receiver. I fooled with it for a couple of hours and took a few minutes walking up and down stairs and around the house, etc. taking videos of my kids as I followed them. It looked not to shabby for a newbie. I did notice that I needed a slight bit more experience using the Magiqcam (underestimation), but most of all, I'll need to go to the gym to keep my lower back in shape as it got noticeably stressed after just 10 minutes. Good thing I didn't buy some stabilizer stick thing. I used a mike stand where I removed the top half and placed the sled into that where I could make the fine adjustments. I then took a small bubble level and got the Magiqcam fairly well balanced by adding just about all the weight on the back and taping the retainer to that. I put the camera smack dab in the middle of the mount, but I think I'm going to try another spot and try adding the light and maybe the system isolator. To get the 2-3 second drop time, you need to extend sled a bit as well. Once you get the thing balanced, it works fairly nicely, but the problem is when you try to put it away - it won't fit and you end up screwing up your settings. Once I get this thing tweaked, I'll score the paint with a knife to line up the parts where I had them so when I put it back in the box, I can find my settings quickly.

I don't think I would score the paint. This is just one setup, of which you will most likely have many while the Magiqcam lasts. I figure that I would include a small, short (6') tape measure in my kit and a small notepad with settings for various configurations. Setup with just camera, camera with ME66 mic on top, camera with light, etc.

I like the idea of using a mic stand. I've got an old one sitting around and didn't think about using it for that.

I've got a few weeks to wait, but I hope it gets here soon. :)

Yes, I think I'll not mark up the unit. Someone said to use whiteout, which can be wiped off with mild solvent. Sounded like sound advice. At least you can use them as a rough estimate and do final tweaking at the job. I did a little jogging with it as well and someone watching me said the camera stayed level like a bird's head. Very cool.

Anyone know if the Magicqams being built now have an arm with an adjustible pitch? I believe that when Charles Papert met with the Magicqam owner, Charles had made some suggestions for improvement. About a month or so back I had corresponded with the owner who had said that all of Charles' suggestions had been incorporated.
I currently have the Steadicam JR (for the moment, anyway). Does the Magicqam gimbal have the capability to tilt?

Dave:

As far as I've heard, the adjustments are in place in the current production model Magiqcam.

The gimbal does tilt, through a complete range as with the other axes.

Has anyone have any success with Magiqcam? I'm looking at Glidecam V-16 plus low mode and vehicle mount. If magiqcam support low mode and vehicle mount, I'll definitely go with magiqcam.

I had a gig pop up for New Years where a floatation device would come in handy. I tried using a monopod as a stabilizer for flying. It *is* better than
handheld but it doesn't cut the mustard. And in a
short amount of time, with a VX and a wide angle,
your arm begins to shake.
I haven't yet called tech support on the JR. My
gut-level feeling is that the VX weight is pushing the
limits of the JR. And the VX is pushing the
limits of my arm. Suddenly, the Magiqcam
is looking better.
Charles, that guy with the HBS, who shot the
skate board footage, how did he shoot that?
Was he running while shooting? I wanna shoot
like that guy!

<<<-- Originally posted by jonniesiri : Has anyone have any success with Magiqcam? I'm looking at Glidecam V-16 plus low mode and vehicle mount. If magiqcam support low mode and vehicle mount, I'll definitely go with magiqcam. -->>>

Magiqcam does have a low mode setup on their website . Haven't seen a vehicle mount listed, but that is a very simple part & I would recommend basing your decision around the stabilizers themselves.

Regarding low-mode--it's easier and sometimes better to just flip the unit upside down and rebalance, then re-invert the image in post. The mount is usually more stable this way than a suspended cage setup, and definitely quicker to configure.

Dave;

I can't say for sure about Cody's skateboard material, it looks like he was riding one himself. At that speed, I would have expected some jitter in the footage if he was running flat out. I personally don't recommend using a wearable stabilizer in conjunction with skateboard/rollerblades/skis and the like; if your center of gravity shifts suddenly you can lose control of the rig and the crash can be spectacular. Many have done it successfully, however; some have come home with their rigs in a trash bag.

Cody has definitely put in his practice time with his gear, and it shows.

I will be purchasing the Magiqcam rig very soon and will let you know my thoughts as well.

Do let us know, Kevin. Have you used any
stabilizer before?

Yes. I've used a friend's HMS before. In car, on rollerblades, running, walking, backwards and forwards for all of them, and even on a glide cable.

I'm no Charles Papert when it comes to my expertise with body stabalizers, but I know what looks good and what doesn't and from a "down and dirty" aspect, I can give you my opinion on it as a creative user of such rigs.... and test footage.

I'm "this close" to getting the Magiqcam. The handheld
didn't work out for me. I'm not "Arnold", if you know what I mean.

I recieved my camera yesterday and my first initial thoughts are, "wow, how did most people miss this?" -

I recieved it in it's carrying case today, and out of the box I had it assembled in about 5 minutes. Cross balancing was easy, because of the Table top camera mount sliding far left and right or front and back. It has a series of different positioned holes on the table to help even further for cross balancing. The kit comes with 5 or 6 heavy washers, that slide onto a the weight pole on the slanted sled arm. Then there's a retainer ring you put over the washers, that tightens to the metal nub which holds the washers. You can move both sled arms at the bottom around 360 degrees to help balance when you have monitor/batteries/weights on it. The vest is very comfortable, and very easily adjustable.

I havn't had the chance yet to use it in "normal" practice, just in my house and around my neighboorhood for a small amount of time. When I did test it, though it ran extrememly smooth in all functions. I can already in my first hour outdo their demo footage on the magiqcam website.. which means I'm pretty confident in saying who-ever was using the magiqcam for that demo footage didn't know how to use a stabilizer or must have really been jerking it around... hard. I ran to my local BP and back with it, and got back just a big tired. The vest has pretty good weight distribution and wasn't too hard on my lower back. I was using it with an XL-1s that had more accessories than R2-D2 on it.

I'll have a more in depth review when I have the chance to use it in more extreme conditions, and a video short to watch.

I'm very very happy with this purchase, and got much more than what I was expecting from it. I'll have the more in-depth review very soon as I'll be using it on an upcoming local production. I'll even have a review on the low-dog mode, too.

How long did it take to get it between ordering and
arrival?
Also, does the arm have an adjustible pitch angle
from the vest?
Does anyone have an idea which of the two Magiqcams would be better for my situation? My cam (with accessories) is on the upper weight limit of the smaller unit they offer and it's on the lower
weight limit of their larger rig. The lower arm
section of their larger unit has a spring and there
appears to be about a 3" section between where
the upper and lower arm sections meet. The smaller
rig has a lower arm section with no spring and
it appears there is only about a 1" distance between
where the upper section meets the lower.
Any opinions on the smaller versus the larger
rig (i.e. springed lower section versus not,
and 1" versus 3" between the arm sections)
and how this might affect usage/performance
would be, of course, appreciated.

Dave:

The dual arm will give you a much greater boom range than the single arm, and for $200 it would be worth it. You'd just make yourself a steel plate to bring your camera up a few lbs. I'd get it into the middle of the weight range of the 2a, these design of arms work better when they are at their top load than their minimum. The other thing is that this leaves you some flex in load bearing for unseen accessories (onboard light? lightweight telemprompter? Mini35?) or a bigger camera down the road.

More mass on the rig also means more stable shots. Unless you are planning marathon shooting sessions, the added weight shouldn't be a killer once you've gotten used to it. It's nowhere near as insidious as a handheld stabilizer that way. And yes, I have confirmed that the Magiqcam now offers an adjustable pitch connection at the vest, which makes it an exceptional value at this price point.

As far as the apparent gap in the arm: the less gap, the more range generally. John at Animagique should be able to answer this for you. Tell him I sent you!

Dave,

I had it shipped 2 day Fed-Ex, and was shipped within 2 days of my order, but I bought mine second hand but never used.

I'd go with the series II if I were you, Dave. The weight on the low end of the specs means it'll be easier to keep your camera balanced than with the smaller one where the weight's on the higher end of it's capabilities.

The dual arm allows for greater reach, pitch, movment, etc. The 3" section between arms you're talking about is a joint so that it swivels like a snake. So you can create an "L" with the two arms. Unless of course you were talking about the distance of the upper arm bar from the lower arm bar, per arm.

The series II (double arm) is very great and I'd imagine the single arm wouldn't be near as good, especially with the camera on the higher weight line.

Thanks guys. Just to clarify, the smaller rig *is* a
dual arm, but it doesn't have a spring on the lower
arm section. The larger Series IIa does have a
spring on the lower section of the arm.
I do notice that the lower arm section of the
smaller rig seems to be shorter than the
lower arm of the larger rig. I would think that,
for this reason, the larger rig would give more
range/boom distance.
Charles, how would the extra steel plate
be attached to the larger rig in order to
bring up the weight. In my situation, I'd
have to attach about 3 pounds to hit the
mid range (i.e. 9 pounds) of the larger rig.
I do have a battery (for the Pag C6 light) that
normally is slung over the shoulder and
which weighs a few pounds. I wonder if
I could attach this to the arm some how
to bring up the weight?

Yes yes. The single action arm was pioneered by Cinema Products (the original manufacturer of Steadicam before Tiffen) with the SK model. Since then the shorthand is "single arm" or "dual arm" but as you noted all arms have an articulated design to allow for clearance from the body and maximum maneuverability. A more accurate term would be "single action" or "dual action".

A dual arm (sorry, dual action arm!) not only doubles the boom range, but it can also improve the shock absorption capability of the arm. It should be noted that the basic design of this class of stabilizer arms is fairly flawed in comparison to even the original, circa 1975 Steadicam production model which incorporated springs and pulleys in an effort to make the lifting force linear throughout the boom range (the Glidecam Gold arm uses this design). The basic "desk lamp" design of most of the DV stabilizers will tend to bounce and also allow a certain amount of vibration through that would be absent on the more sophisticated arms. As it turns out, a certain amount of "pogo-ing" is acceptable in a stabilizer arm, which is one reason why the handheld rigs are possible. In other words, a slight up-and-down motion will not necessarily read on camera because the image is not being displaced signficantly. As a point of comparison, imagine the difference between booming the camera up and down two inches, and tilting the camera up and down two inches. The tilt is much more noticeable as a move. The exception to all this is if you have foreground close to the lens, in which case a deflection in boom will be more apparent due to the parallax shift.

Heady stuff, don't know why I got on that roll. Must be warming up for my instructional video or something.

Dave:

The ideal weight setup assuming your camera is well balanced is just to have a 3lb steel plate that would mount between the top stage of the rig (tapped with the requisite 1/4"-20 threads and locator hole), and then attaching the camera or the quick release to the top of the steel plate (drilled out from the bottom to allow the camera screw to be sunken into place). You mount the plate to the camera, then the plate to the platform and you are good to go. Very easy and cheap to have a local machinist whip up, or you can make it yourself if you have a workshop.

You wouldn't want to put the battery pack on the arm, that would just be dead weight you are hauling around that isn't going to work for you at increasing the inertia of the rig. You would want to attach it to the camera somehow. Again, a machinist would be the man to help with this. It's very critical with stabilizers to have all of the components buttoned down, so strapping or taping something into place could be an issue for operating.

John Gardner just sent me the tracking number for my MagiqCam. Looks like I'm finally going to have a new toy to play with soon. I know it will have been worth the wait. :)

Charles,
John's wife says "Hi". Their Paypal was down so I had
to call.

I just received my sled upgrade. It is much improved over the original. First, it appears that the bearings have been upgraded to even a more smooth motion with bearings on all x,y,z axis. The camera mount is a standard bogen tripod plate which allows for forward, back and side to side adjustments quite easily. In addition, the black metal has been nicely powder coated and the sled is a bit lighter in weight. The quick tripod release will make it much easier to move from tripod to stabilizer and back again more easily.

My Magiqcam arrived the beginning of this week. I've been stuck at work all week and will finally get a chance to balance it this weekend. I wish the instructions were a little better on that front. How do you guys balance your Magiqcam? Do you start with getting the monitor and battery in balance, then add the camera?

I've been having trouble getting my order through.
Paypal's been having me jump through
hoops regarding a "sending limit".
Does anyone know what the normal PayPal
sending limit is if you are not "verified"?

Joe:

<<Do you start with getting the monitor and battery in balance, then add the camera?>>

Yes, that is a good start. The easiest way to do this is to place the bottom of the post on a fulcrum (could be as simple as a pen) to determine if the sled falls forwards or backwards, then adjust the monitor or battery until it comes close to levelling out.

I placed mine on a mic stand. Make sure one of the legs is towards the sled and camera as it may tip over. Put on all your weight and monitor. Try to guestimate where your camera's center of gravity is (the XL1 is toward the NW looking down on the camera) and place the camera on the sled in that position, where the center of gravity of the camera would be over the center pole of the sled. Next, rotate the two counterbalances to get a level postition and add or remove weight if needed. I use a little bubble level to help me with that. Now, tip the sled horizontally and let it drop. It should take 2-3 seconds to go verticle. If not, shorten or lengthen the bottom half of the sled to adjust the fall time - shorter for slower and longer for faster. It takes some time at first, but after a while you get quicker at it. Unfortunately, to put the sled away you have to collapse everything and mess up all your adjustments.

Dave, if by "rotate the two counterbalances to get a level position" you mean you are rotating the monitor and/or battery around the post, I wouldn't recommend that. Your best results will be to keep both aligned with the direction of the camera, with the monitor at 12 o'clock and the battery at 6 o'clock. It's reasonable to ask, "why does the Magiqcam let me do that then?" and the answer is just because it can be done, doesn't mean it should be done for a standard setup. Even though the rig may appear to be level when hanging on the dock, which is called static balance, if the masses are not aligned properly the rig will be said to be out of dynamic balance which becomes an issue when the rig is rotated, causing it to dip during pans.

The theory behind this is a bit advanced and will be handled to an extent in my training video, but for now my strong recommendation is not to make your side to side balance by rotating lower components but by adjusting the camera position. Joe's hunch was correct in that the sled needs to be balanced first and then the camera added.

It is entirely possible to make shots with a rig that is not dynamically balanced, however, the rig will not find its sweet spot and will generally behave a little more erratically. The more time one spends operating, the more apparent the difference is.

As Tim Allen said in Galaxy Quest - "We'll do that!"

Keeping everything lined up just makes sense in a physics standpoint, for making it even possible to setup dynamic balance. I think everyon trying to balance a steadicam type system sould read through Jerry's Dynamic Balance Primer (http://www.jerryholway.com/docs/dynamicPrimer.pdf)

I've got to wait until my batteries get here to finish balancing everything. The engineer in me had to do some empirical testing to determine battery weight before ordering. So I hung a gallon jug from my intended battery CG and started adding water. Once I got a balance looking level, I measured the water in ounces. Then converted to gallons (128 oz per gal.) and gallons to pounds (8.345 lbs per gal.) I decided to go ahead and use Gel Cells, as I wound up needing the weight. At 4 lbs, I can get a 5 Ah battery, which should run my 7" 16:9 LCD for over 3 hours. Hard to beat $16 bucks for each battery. Definitely not worth the price and work to build up my own NiCads.

Included with the Magiqcam is now a stand that mounts on top of a light stand. But, it doesn't hold the sled far enough away to spin in dynamic balancing. I guess it would if I use the arm also on the mount, but that would complicate things a little. All in all, I'm really impressed with the Magiqcam for the price. Now, if only my batteries would get here... :)

Joe,
Which LCD are you using with the Magiqcam? I thought there was only room for a 5" or so.

Good job reading the DB white paper. It's heady stuff, yeah? The interesting thing about dynamic balance is that there are various schools of thought about interpreting within the professional Steadicam community. Jerry (and Garrett) feel that even with a balanced sled, you still need to make adjustments based on the exact camera that is used, whereas others believe that if the sled is balanced and the camera properly placed, it doesn't matter which camera you use.

Good note on the docking bracket, I'll let John at Magiqcam know that he should be accomodating that need.

Regarding batteries, I know you have made your choices but just in case things change for you, you might want to look into Dewalt batteries, the type used for power tools. They are cheap (around $40), positive locking to prevent shifting on the rig, easy to find, the charger costs about the same, and they run a long time. You just need to figure out a mounting setup. They make an inexpensive flashlight that you can chop down to get the female mount and then build an adaptor to accomodate.

Dave,
The LCD I am using is TM-7002S (http://www.digitalww.com/LCD_TM_7002S_BLACK.htm). It is designed to mount in a car's headrest. It is 720x480 pixel resolution and seems to have a nice picture. It is 3/4" taller than the mount and sticks out sideways. But, I've used industrial grade stick on velcro and I can shake it like crazy and it stays in place well. The only downside is a 1.2 Amp draw on power. The site mentions < 6W, but 1.2 A is on the back. To me that is 14.4 W. I haven't hooked up an Ammeter to it yet to get an accurate reading. But, since I need a little more weight onto my setup to load the arm how I want, a big battery isn't a problem. I'm really happy with the LCD for $200. It also has nice flat sides of 3/4" of an inch. I can use velcro to mount a hood, if I need to for outdoor shots.

It has a connector right at the monitor which is actually a 6 pin Din plug used for keyboard or mouse. I tested the included cable and it uses two conductors each for power, video1 and video2 (has two switchable video inputs). I ordered a few of them from Mouser electronics, with the batteries and a couple 4 conductor 3.5 mm plugs. (This is the headphone plug with an extra conductor, that is usually used on camcorders for Video and Stereo audio out.) This should allow me to run a video cable up the center of the sled tube and come out the top with a plug to go directly into the camcorder. I can also use these plugs to go into the FM radio transmitters. I've been testing these to use on set for everyone to hear audio. They are thw devices to send audio to your car stereo. With a little better antenna and the crew with small FM radios, you get distributed audio. :)

Charles,
I'm an electrical engineer, by degree, so I took enough statics and dynamics to make it pretty light reading. But being specific to the task at hand was great to get a better understand of a steadicam as a system.

As far as the docking bracket, I'm still trying to figure out exactly how it is supposed to be used. I think John is like me in that he would rather create than write documentation. :) You can mount just the sled on the mount pretty easily. This torques the mount a little, but the hole is so close to the c-stand mount that it isn't a problem. It also works with mounting the arm in the mount and holding both of them. This actually balances it more on the mount. However, due to the design, it is difficult to get the arm out of the mount and near impossible if the sled is still attached. I'll have to mess with it more to see if I can think of a better way to do it. It seems like if you make it far enough so that a dynamic balance spin can happen, you would need to weight down the other side to balance. I wouldn't want to cantalever that much on a c-stand.

I initially looked at going for pre-made power tool batteries. They are usually very high quality cells and chargers. I don't like the design of the DeWalt and others which have one cell inside handle. This would mount the battery too high up off the base. The older Black and Decker and Milwalkee have more of a slide on design for the batteries. I considered getting one of the 12V flashlights for these types of batteries and hacking it off for a mount, but they are all still only up to 2 Ah capacity. The mount that John provides is around 2" x 4-5". So all that I will need to do is put velcro on the mount and on the bottom of the batteries. That will be strong enough for balancing. Then use one strap around the battery and mount to keep it down on the velcro. When velcro is attached, the shearing strength is great. You can get a smart charger for Gel-Cells for about $40. Gel-Cells are constant current, so it goes dual mode. First, it pushes the maximum current into the battery. When it is close to charged, it goes into float where it can safely stay. Not as fast charging as NiCads, but at $16 bucks a pop, you can have a couple around.

I can't wait for the batteries. I want to get it working now! :)

Joe:

Again, sounds like you have a good grasp of what you are up to, cheers to that.

I agree that the Dewalt setup is not ideal, I just like the pricing (my work setup includes 9 batteries at $400 a whack, plus an $800 charger, you get the picture!). I couldn't remember how the battery plate looked on the M'cam, thanks for the reminder. My feeling is that John should probably be offering batteries as an option, I think some people would rather just buy the whole package rather than deal with all this themselves. Obviously with your background you're in good shape to make those decisions.

In terms of the docking bracket, suffice to say that we routinely spin balance our 50 lbs+ of sled on a stand, so it certainly can be done (here's the one I use (http://steadimoves.com/parts.html); scroll down to "Hill Docking Bracket"). I'm not a fan of C-stands in general for rig docking; the footprint of the legs is too small, they require sandbags and they don't have wheels. A heavy duty Baby Roller stand is a good way to go. Using the arm when attempting a spin balance seems like it wouldn't work. An extension piece between your dock and gimbal sounds like the ticket, and then you would have to plop a sandbag on the back side to counterweight it, as well as resting on the leg of the stand to make sure it doesn't tip.

For a C-Stand to use, I picked up a very large stand. It was a SystemPRO LS-3 from Promaster. It was under $50, but has a large footprint for a c-stand (legs form a triangle with over 3 feet edges). All the way closed down, it is the perfect height for me, but it also extends up to about 10 feet from the ground, which fits another need I had. Looks pretty sturdy for something from ProMaster.

Well, I just tried out the new sled. I balanced it front to back without twisting the weights as recommended. I must say it looks more "stable" than my previous sled. I went up and down stairs and it looked spooky - very smooth, foating. You're right about the up and down motion as not being very noticeable. I deliberately pogoed the sled and on playback it didn't seem that much movement compared to what I thought I had moved the sled - interesting. Abrupt lateral movement is more noticeable. I walked around an object in a circle but I "crab-walked" as I had read someone do, but I noticed my starts and stops more and wondered why I couldn't turn the sled at 90 deg. and just walk around the subject, keeping the subject in the frame. Also, if both your hands are on the sled, how do you focus and zoom? I suppose you can use a Varizoom or something similar. Someone remarked that he didn't zoom, but just walked up to the subject/talent (it's interesting they call the person in front of the lens the "talent" :^). I think you would need to use auto focus and forget about zooming. Now, I'm using video glasses when I use the Magiqcam, so I don't have to worry about where the monitor is or where the camera is aiming. I can even shoot over my shoulder and walk forward so I can see where I'm going. The glasses are the same resolution as my viewfinder, so no compromise there. But the main reason for using them is outdoor sun - can't see a monitor even with a hood. It seems that if sun is at high noon it reflects right off the screen and creates glare, not to mention wash out of the LCD display. I just got a heads up from the manufacturer on the glasses. Seems they're coming out with a HD resolution version. Anyway, I'm using autofocus anyway and only need to frame the shot, so that's really not an issue for me.
Any feedback?

What are video glasses?