Saved by the Rod!

[Tom Van den Berghe]

chris,

I saw that the camtree rod belt has a 15mm rod adapter; for me with my mattebox that would be very easy to use

so just unscrew the rod from the 15 rod adapter and place camcorder on tripod
then grab the rod and put it on the floor something like that?

or can the rod stay on the belt like a sword?

[Chris Harding]

Hi Tom

There is no unscrewing at all. The flexi joint at the end of the support rod has a 1/4" brass pin and the fitting on your matte box is essentially a chunk of aluminium with a 1/4" hole under the centre. The rod simply drops in and out ..when you want to stop, you simply lift the rod out and to carry on snap the pin into the hole ...it's instant and easy. Yep if I use the camera I'll often slip the rod thru my belt like a sword otherwise it just sits with the camera on the table.

Chris

[Tom Van den Berghe]

CHris,

time to buy a waist belt rod. You did some adjustments with the camtree. The ball joint was not good?
There are no much other choices from other brands. only this one I havefound from F&V:

F&V DSLR Rig Support Rod / Belt fit Shoulder Mount Steady Video Camcorder Camera DV.-in Photo Studio Accessories from Electronics on Aliexpress.com

[Chris Harding]

Hi Tom

I'm just a bit fussy about comfort so I did a stack of mods to mine that just suited me. I would say both are much the same !

This is what I found wrong on the Cine City one but at the cheap price it was worth getting anyway.

(1) I didn't like the Velcro belt ..it is too wide and you can't make it tight enough. I made my own belt from an old "fanny bag" I just prefer the buckle type of belt that you can pull the strap to tighten it.

(2) The fitting on the belt is crappy and in the wrong place!! OK, I tossed out the aluminium ball and round disk that slides into the belt ... for the rod length it sits way too high! Mine has a simple "shelf bracket" bolted thru the belt so the rod connects UNDER the belt so it's length is correct. I have a mini ball head joint attached to the shelf bracket so the joint is 100% flexible

The fittings and workings at the top of the rod all work fine BUT I also shortened the fitting at the end by cutting the plastic .... To use the rod and belt as it is manufactured, you need to be at least 7' tall!!!

As I have it now it's perfect !! Let me know if you need any specific modification details?

Chris

[Tom Van den Berghe]

Chris,

I don't know.
This is the F&V rod belt:

DSLR Rig Support Rod Teleskopstange mit Klett-Bauchgurt - by www.enjoyyourcamera.com - YouTube

What about a steadycam or a spring arm? maybe crazy with a shouldercam?

thx for always answering my questions

[Don Bloom]

Nothing crazy about using a spring rod with a shoulder cam. I used the DV ENG Rig on my Sony DSR models and my JVC DV5000/51000 cameras. I would use it on the HM700 but JVC changed the foot plate and it won't fit.
Here in the USA many if not most of the cameramen that shoot the PGA tour (the camera guys that walk not the hard cameras) use some sort of spring rod to help keep the camera from moving around especially when they're using the longer end of the lens.
I used the DV MultiRig for many years when I used small form factor cameras (IE Sony PD series) and with some practice I could walk in any direction and get some very smooth footage and if I needed to lock down for an extended period I could do that too. It was almost as good as a tripod. Notice I said almost. BTW, I could do the same with the ENG Rig on the full size cams. I really missed using it on the HM700.
Also that belt looks like the same belt that Danny N. made for his DV MultiRig units. I had that and a pouch for a standard belt but preferred the bigger belt.

[Tom Van den Berghe]

Don,

do you mean this rod?

EngRig full size shoulder system for camcorders - ***** DVTEC

The one that Chris has is much cheaper and the one from my link is the cheapest.

[Don Bloom]

yes that's the one but when I bought it many years ago, it came with the mounting plate for the camera and was much less expensive. I will say this about the DV Tec gear though. The price is high but the quality is superb.

The point I was making is that even with a full size camera when off the tripod, some sort of support is ALWAYS a good thing. Even my HM700 when "dressed up" weights about 16 pounds and isn't balanced as well as I'd like so the spring rod regardless of where it comes from is a big big help.

[Chris Harding]

Hi Tom

I would say that's much the same rod as the CineCity one ...I would suspect that one manufacturer in China makes them so as long as the principle is the same it doesn't matter where it comes from. Mine was $65.00

I would just buy the whole thing then change what you don't like. You might love the Velcro style wider belt that comes with it ...I prefer a thinner belt with a clip.

Unless you are very tall I would suspect you might need to move the pouch position lower and trim a bit off the top of the rod fitting as it's way too long for me anyway. Still well worth getting and will give you quite amazing stability and no aching back after lots of handheld shooting

Chris

[Tom Van den Berghe]

i took a closer look to the camtree rod and dvtec engrig and they look both the same. (like you said Chris) But the engrig is much more expensive! (suppose the camtree is a knock-off) Still don't understand why the rods are too long Chris with you?

the pictures I see from the camtree I see a normal tall man and the rods don't look to long.

[Chris Harding]

Hi Tom

It's just a promo photo you are looking at. Take a careful look at the photo and you will see that both thumbscrew adjusters are next to each other so both tubes are fully compressed already ..they just did that for the photo so it looks correct but in fact it IS too long in practice.

Simple to fix though...You can chop a decent amount off the top flexi-fitting without causing any problems and I just dropped the pouch/joint so it's lower than shown.

Still worth buying for $65.00!! It's fairly easy to modify

Chris

[Tom Van den Berghe]

hey Chris,

look what I got! Yes, the camtree rod. looks very good to me but like you said it's too long.
Can you tell me with a picture where to cut off please?

thx!

[Serggio Lamas]

Hi Chris

with a rear counterweight battery for the light you will have no problem pulling the shoulder for a long time and the camera remains steady

[Chris Harding]

Hi Serggio

If you look at older threads here you will see that a light battery does nothing and, in fact you need around 3kg of counterweight to balance out the camera which makes it VERY heavy on your shoulder. The rod works a lot better because it lifts the weight of the front end via the springs. This means if you change lenses it always works...if you used just a counterweight you would need to also adjust it every time you changed a lens!!

Chris

[Chris Harding]

Hi Tom

Ok here is the routine to make that piece shorter.

(1) Unscrew the flexi-joint so you have just the plastic fitting attached to the rod.
(2) look at the top few millimetres of the rod and you will see a pin securing it to the top tube. Use a nail and a light hammer to simply drive it out (the hole goes right thru)
(3) Pull out the plastic fitting and you will see the top is the fat bit and the end piece is the thinner piece that went inside the top tube.
(4) Drill a 5mm hole right thru from top to bottom ...it's already drilled 3/4 way so just continue the hole so it exits out the skinny bit at the bottom.
(5) Use a 1/4"BSW tap (cheap at the hardware store) and cut a thread starting at the thin end where your drill bit came out and turn the tap in until a thread has been cut the length of the thin section only.
(6) Use a hacksaw to cut off just the thin section and wack it back into the top tube and because you have a thread going thru the middle now ..screw the flexi-joint into that and discard the fat section of plastic

Voila ..your rod is now around 3" shorter!! and is great to use!!


Also remember that I actually have scrapped the bottom plastic plate and it's ball joint too! My rod has nothing on the end at all (except for the thread where the ball threaded piece went in) Instead on the belt part I have a cheap "L" shaped shelf bracket that also drops everything lower down ...I have a standard mini ball head bolted to the piece of the bracket that sticks out and on top of the mini ball head is a piece of plastic PVC pipe that acts as a receiver for the rod. There is a pic on post #6 of this very thread so you can see how I have done it.

Chris