James,

When Wayne talked about obstructed vision I didn't know which ones he was talking about. I've never tried the small ones so I don't know how well they work or what kind of vision problem you might have with them.

I did have some iglasses which had see through lenses but the cable kept messing up my balance so I sold them.

Tery

I can understand these not being used in all applications but for instance, in a controlled environment, riding on a large dolly with a jib arm, controlled shot, couldn't these work for at least some framing work where a monitor might be cumbersome?

All I can tell you, Michael, is that in all the shoots I have worked on, I have NEVER seen a jib operator use any of these glasses. If they worked, I'm sure someone would be using them. One of the problems is that with a jib, as you boom down and tilt up, you can easily tilt up too far, which causes you to boom too low searching for your final frame, and possibly crashing into the ground, or, gasp, a person seated in the audience. You need to be able to see the world around the camera, as well as the picture, to operate safely. There is no situation where I can imagine using these glasses safely.

Wayne Orr, SOC

Makes sense.....Thanks!

I did a shot today that, had I owned a pair of video glasses, I would have used them. It started looking straight down at a patient (this was on "ER"), rotated around her head and then pulled away and boomed down until we were below the level of the gurney looking across the patient towards the doctor standing a few feet away. I did it off the fluid head on the dolly, using the complete boom range of the arm; capped off the eyepiece and mounted an onboard LCD monitor via magic arm to the side of the head. This way the monitor would pan with the camera but not tilt. I had a pretty good view of the monitor at all times, but I did have to maneuver my body around to achieve this. With the glasses, I might have possibly been more comfy.

I tried unsuccessfully to find a picture of Jimmy Muro, one of our legendary Steadicam brethren now enjoying a promising DP career, operating the tiny SL Cine 2C conversion on "Strange Days". He held this 5 lb modified Arri in front of him to simulate the point of view shots represented as virtual reality in the movie, and was able to run flat-out up stairs, through rooms, jump across chasms etc. thanks to an earlier version of the video glasses.

I rarely see them in action, but they do pop up occasionally and as the technology improves, will likely have more uses in our field. Wayne's point about jib safety is absolutely well taken--you need all of your peripheral vision for one-man jibs, Steadicam etc., but I could easily see a use for them with a manually operated (i.e. no remote head) jib shot that goes from ground level to overhead, with a grip operating the actual swing of the arm to make it safe.

That is what I wish I had conveyed in the first post, I completely understand the peripheral issue but if I'm stationary on a large dolly, 40 ft run, with no lateral jib movement, (lib arm is perpendicular to the dolly track so the camera is away from the track as it moves along up and over a poker table to finish the shot) and a crew, it would seem to me it could help with framing. As a whole I can see the issues with it but I would think there would have to be some advantages in a certain few situations.

I tried using Sony glasses with a jimmy jib arm once, and never used it again. The reason? You can see peripherally, and in about 3 minutes, you'll get motion sickness. Trust me, it doesn't work.

Another nice standard tx/rx kit for camcorders, powered by batteries:

http://www.flex-cam.com/SPECIALS_Kit1.html

I used to get motion sick from first person shooters back in 1994 or so. They don't bother me now. Don't you think you would just get used to the Sony glasses.