Guys, I'm doing a class for some high school students, and need to find a particular site I once saw. It depicted how to build a zepplin on the cheap, using a Liter bottle, etc. I can't locate, and Googling nor other search tools find it either.
Anyone have a clue?

Even though these don't work well, I wanted to show the kids how ingenuity makes many things more possible. So I'm showing them how to build safe, albeit ugly, production kits from things found around the house.

Was this it, Spot? No photos, but a description:

http://www.bealecorner.com/trv900/mic.html#wind

Nope, that's not the one, Chris, but the description is almost exactly the same as the one I saw that had lotsa photos.
The one I'd seen also showed a dowel being used as a screwon boom pole mount, using a light bulb changing rod for the boom. Seems there were some dolly plans with it all too.

Douglas,
That's great. Those sound like some lucky kids.

Actually, I'm a lucky guy. I love teaching and working with students. Sometimes, because of the books, DVD's, and tours, I get invited to do workshops for kids. This one has a special emphasis on audio for video, so I'm really gonna have a great time.

Man, I just found a whole bunch of really cool DIY stuff here, including a lot of production gear (http://www.jushhome.com/AmMoviePort/links.asp?CatId=153), with photos. No zepp, though.

And here's the DIY boom mic pole with shock mount (http://www.fanfilmsforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=555) for under $20. Enjoy!

Sorry I don't have what you're looking for, but I always thought it would be easy to make your own zeppelin like a basket.

Am I the only one who had to make a basket in high school? Maybe my art teacher had a premonition about my level of sophistication and put me on a project that's popular in third world countries. (*sigh*... I'm a simpleton.)

Anyway, a basket built around a 1 liter bottle would be easy to make and DIRT, DIRT cheap... then you'd just have to leave the back end of the basket open... where the bottle top was, then cut off the upper fourth of the bottle. Then you'd have an end which could be screwed in place and still be removable for popping the mic in and out of the zepp.

If you used even moderately strong bamboo, wood, or whatever baskets are made of... then you could have two rubber bands, alla AT or PSC style, running through it.

Finally you could pull a stretchy woman's sock or stocking over the final product and band/tie/velcro it at the bottle end where the wire runs out.

Does this sound as stupid as I think it does? I just came up with this off the top of my head when you mentioned a 2 liter bottle.

I've even seen them made out of rabbit wire, but I don't want to *make* one, I've got a nice Rycote. What I want is to show these kids a few pictures....that's all. But yeah, hadn't considered a basket.

Spot,

I remember the site. Unfortunately, my recollection is that it was on either the old Canopus site, or the JustEditors.com site (Chris Hurd should remember that one), both of which are defunct.

Either of these archived somewhere?

try http://www.archive.org?

Hmmm.. . great resource. I found portions of the JustEditors.com site, but it looks like it's only the front page of each section, not any of the back pages of the forum.

If anyone has better luck than I did, or has access to the rest of the site, it would be in the Tips 'n' Techniques forum.

Douglas, here's one, not a zepplin as such but a wire cage style one.

http://www.volksmovie.com/tech/inventions/micshockmount.htm


Aaron

Aaron, that will work perfectly! Thank you for the point. There are pictures there, so that's a good thing.