I have a shoot in about three weeks where I will have to do most of the shoot hand held .I was thinking about trying a monpod. Has anyone used one with a 250. I was looking at one from bogen with a fluid head. mostly as a leaning post to help stabilize my shoot some. it will be a long day and near the end I know I may get a little shakey .If I was going to be on just one location ,or had time to set up from location to location I would use my tripod. I would love to hear the good. the bad. and the ugly. Thank You for your help

John Thomason

while I have not used a monopod with a HD250 I have used one with other fullsized rigs and while it can be a bit awkward at times it did help.However the best thing I owned other than a tripod was a ENG ProRIg by DVTec. Although when I got it I got it from Varizoom I later found out that Danny from DVTec actually made the rig. It is more money than the monpod but in all honesty it worked better than I could have ever imagined. With an AB Dionic90 battery an AB ULtralight on top and a wireless receiver hanging off the back of both a JVC5000U and a Sony DSR250 I could literally let go of the camera and it would sit comfortably and stabily on my shoulder. NO I never did let go but it sure helped keeping the camera stabile on long handheld shoots. Of course it doesn't replace the good old tripod but for the times you need mobility and stability it can't be beat.

Here is the DVTec rig made for the JVC HD100:
JVC HDV Support (http://www.dvtec.tv/id22.html)

Hey Don, did you have any trouble with the "pouch" belt clip that attaches to the Velcro belt? Seems like every time I used it, it popped off. Other than that, it did work very will with my 250u, though I could only use two screws to attach the plate to the camera, which needed to be frequently tightened.

No actually when I got the rig it had a belt with the pouch sewn in.My DVMultiRig came with just the pouch whichgot a bit uncomfortable so I used the belt from the ENG Rig. The hardest part is finding just the right place to place the belt. I found just above my hips works the best both for the ENG rig and Multirig.
BTW the ENG rig I got was drilled for both Sony and JVC. The screws on the front foot are actually a bit different of course.
IMO Danny N. has really hit a home run with his products. Not only do they work but they are very well made.

John, we've tried out a monopod at a rock concert for reduced space need, but found it not solid enough. it had a tendency to arch under the weight of the cam, mattebox, sony battery and HDD. i don't remember the brand.

Also, while vertical stability is a bit better, you're very vulnerable to shoves etc making the frame jerk awkwardly.

audiences can understand small two-dimensional camera instabilities but one-dimensional looks odd.

We dropped it.

the DVtec looks promising

Thank You all for all the good information. I am looking to get a ENGrig. Just from reading your experiences with it and A monopod , I have to agree the ENGrig looks to be best suited for my needs