Glidecam 4000 - First Thoughts Specific For Wedding Use

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Buba Kastorski

after one week of practice?
I'd say amazing result, and I've had one (GC 4000) before,

Well, actually that was as of three days use. Got it Thursday afternoon, ran around the yard a bunch. Got tired and gave up for the day. Went to DVinfo and rewatched all the amazing footage from people using steadicam type devices in their wedding videos to get ideas for how to use them. Friday I was busy fixing a Photo Memory Movie for my clients that evening. Then Saturday a bit of shooting with the Glidecam and the Panasonic GS320. Then Sunday the Save The Date shoot clips that you saw.

:-)

[Danny O'Neill]

The glidecam was harder than i thought to get used to. I cannot use it without the smooth shooter arm, i did some shots handheld and it really shows. Even with it I always tend to have a bit of roll but your stuff is pretty good.

It takes a while to understand the physics, what happens if the weights are close to the post, what happens if there further away. Long post vs more weights etc.

The problem I still face is when I start walking the movement of my hips translates to my controlling hand and you get a side to side movement in the camera. Might try adjusting the weights to be more to the edge to see if that helps. But that gives more momentum when panning and makes it harder to control. It does give some great shots though but ive recently learnt not to use during a ceremony, just at the end for the walk out.

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Danny O'Neill

The glidecam was harder than i thought to get used to. I cannot use it without the smooth shooter arm, i did some shots handheld and it really shows. Even with it I always tend to have a bit of roll but your stuff is pretty good.

It takes a while to understand the physics, what happens if the weights are close to the post, what happens if there further away. Long post vs more weights etc.

The problem I still face is when I start walking the movement of my hips translates to my controlling hand and you get a side to side movement in the camera. Might try adjusting the weights to be more to the edge to see if that helps. But that gives more momentum when panning and makes it harder to control. It does give some great shots though but ive recently learnt not to use during a ceremony, just at the end for the walk out.

When I bought this, I specifically had in mind the walk in and walk out, as well as a few shots shooting across the chairs from low angles. I also wanted the flying around the bride & groom shot for the first dance. I've walked around with the DVmultirig pro on, but it just doesn't cut it.

Incidentally, I noticed that Mark Von Laken is holding a class at WEVA 08 dedicated to the DVMultiRig Pro. I wonder what tricks they have been able to tease out of the multirig that I've given up on.....

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Danny O'Neill

The glidecam was harder than i thought to get used to. I cannot use it without the smooth shooter arm, i did some shots handheld and it really shows. Even with it I always tend to have a bit of roll but your stuff is pretty good.

It takes a while to understand the physics, what happens if the weights are close to the post, what happens if there further away. Long post vs more weights etc.

The problem I still face is when I start walking the movement of my hips translates to my controlling hand and you get a side to side movement in the camera. Might try adjusting the weights to be more to the edge to see if that helps. But that gives more momentum when panning and makes it harder to control. It does give some great shots though but ive recently learnt not to use during a ceremony, just at the end for the walk out.

I pretty much just learned last night on my daily glidecam walk that the fingers below the gimble need to move in the same direction as the camera movement, but ahead slightly. If you side step left, move the fingers just a tad early to counteract the pendulum effect. No I still haven't figured out how to hold it with out bumping the handle into the camera mount frame....

[Matthew Ebenezer]

Hey Jason,

I thought your new Glidecam footage was really good - especially after only a couple of days practice.

Wait till you get to use it at a wedding - it's gonna rock your world.

Looking forward to seeing more of your footage with it.

Cheers,

Matthew.

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Matthew Ebenezer

Hey Jason,
I thought your new Glidecam footage was really good - especially after only a couple of days practice.
Wait till you get to use it at a wedding - it's gonna rock your world.
Looking forward to seeing more of your footage with it.
Cheers,
Matthew.

The problem being I need a QR plate for it (and a tripod that is actually made to have QR plate adapters.... so not my Matthews or Libec) in order to not have to resort to the all too light weight GS320. That or I need another GL2 so I can dedicate one cam to the Glidecam.

[Matthew Ebenezer]

Originally Posted by Jason Robinson

The problem being I need a QR plate for it (and a tripod that is actually made to have QR plate adapters.... so not my Matthews or Libec) in order to not have to resort to the all too light weight GS320. That or I need another GL2 so I can dedicate one cam to the Glidecam.

Ah ... gotcha.

Will you be able to use it for bridal preps and the photo sessions though?

[Danny O'Neill]

Ive just bought a Velbon tripod but a Manfrotto quick release. That way I just have to quickly remove one QR plate and attach another (thanks Richard). The only way to go from one to the other would be to use a manfrotto tripod but there a little over priced IMHO.

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Matthew Ebenezer

Ah ... gotcha.

Will you be able to use it for bridal preps and the photo sessions though?

possibly. the problem is I really cannot hold the Glidecam for more than 30-60 seconds with out resting. I suppose that woudl be good enough to get portrait shots, but I think I'll stick with the MultiRigPro for that. If I rent a second GL2, then I might put it on the GLidecam for portraits.

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Jason Robinson

2) The mounting screw lacks the offset spring loaded peg so anything you mount might swivel around if it gets bumped. Not exactly durable for live shooting environments.

I ended up going to home depot and buying the only cork stick on pads they had available. These were little 1/2" diameter "dots" usually used to insulate kitchen cabinet doors from banging against the frame. I placed these in two rows down the middle in between the drilled holes in the top mounting plate with only about 1/4" in between them. Then I placed two outside rows or cork dots with about 1" in between them (because I still had some left in the package).

These help and almost completely eliminated the camera twist I had noticed earlier.

Solution: $1.05 cork pads. Glidecam, try putting a better version of this on before shipping, because it is completely worth it.

More of the just for fun "Save The Date Teaser" edit will be posted later today. No CC work yet, no audio work yet, but some soundtrack (with tracks from Rosinni, Beethoven, Miller, & Anderson) & Scene 1 & 2 are complete. Only Scene 3 remains and it might be less than 1/4 the entire project.

At the request of the couple, I am making a long edit first. Potentially 5 minutes or more. They wanted as much of the footage included in as possible, so I'm not cutting it down near as much as I would for a normal Save The Date "Teaser" I'll have to call this one a Save The Date "Featurette" even through the term featurette is used in America to represent a production that is 20-40 minutes in length, instead of 5 minutes. As far as what I would charge for this, hard to say. I've put in easily 30 hrs of editing in the past 3 days (empty house for a weekend allows for lots of work), there was 6 hrs of driving, shooting, and driving, and about 15 hrs of planning & pre-production meetings. I doubt I'll ever see a client that would pay the ~$1000 I would want for a scripted & story boarded 5 minute production. But like I said, this was experimental, in many ways.

[Michael Y Wong]

Jason,

I quickly checked out your Tennis clip and thought it was great. I would strongly advise you keep at it as your 'starter' footage looks absolutely phenomenal so far. I'm sure the crew I work with as well as I would be THRILLED if our early stabilzer footage looked anything close to being that good.

From experience, the Merlin is much much faster to balance and is much much lighter and hence easier on your arms and back. With that said it's gimbal design and placement make it easier to transfer footsteps if you're not careful, and as you mentioned it the glidecam performs better in the wind due to it's heavier weight.

Looking forward to seeing more of your flying.

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Michael Y Wong

Jason,
I quickly checked out your Tennis clip and thought it was great. I would strongly advise you keep at it as your 'starter' footage looks absolutely phenomenal so far. I'm sure the crew I work with as well as I would be THRILLED if our early stabilzer footage looked anything close to being that good.
From experience, the Merlin is much much faster to balance and is much much lighter and hence easier on your arms and back. With that said it's gimbal design and placement make it easier to transfer footsteps if you're not careful, and as you mentioned it the glidecam performs better in the wind due to it's heavier weight.
Looking forward to seeing more of your flying.

Thanks for checking it out. If Stillmotion shoots down in my neck of the woods I'd love to work with ya'll, or at the very least, observe and go out for drinks afterwords. :-)

If you haven't seen it yet, the final StD product is posted in a different thread.