A while back I posted a video of one of my more successful tests flying a Canon T2i DSLR on a Steadicam Merlin. In the Vimeo comment thread, people asked for my recipe¹, and I promised to post it. Time passed². I experimented with other, heavier lenses on my camera, and adjusted the Steadicam to each, erasing the previous settings.

The other day I ran second camera on a commercial shoot, needed to use the kit lens and Rode Videomic, and thus had to dig up my recipe. And there’s the recipe above, that image, taken with a cell phone camera. That’s pretty much all I recorded of my recipe, the rest is easy to derive from there. Here’s how I’ve got it set at the moment:

Another image of that seat-of-the-pants adaptation to steady the Rode Videomic’s shock mount. Click to enlarge photo.

• Stage Mounting Hole: N
• The stage mark is lined up right about at -1.25.
• End Weights: 1 start, 2 full
• Middle Weights: 1 full, 1 finish
• Arc size: if “-” is -1 and “+” is 1, I’m set right around -0.15 –not sure if that’s the same setting as in the photo.
• Gezornenplatz screw is in place, and the arc joint is locked. The setup works best when it is as stiff as possible.

I hope this information is of use to someone.

Edit (2010/08/03): After a day using this reconstructed recipe and reviewing the resulting footage, it’s obviously more bottom heavy than the recipe with which I recorded that clip I’d posted to vimeo. Though this recipe balances the camera, there is sway when changing direction as a result of the bottom’s greater inertia. I think I’m going to try reducing the spar angle and lowering the gimbal so as to better equalize top and bottom. I want to get back to a 3-5 second drop time.⁴

1. A combination of steadicam weights and settings for a particular camera configuration and style of shooting is called a “recipe”, in the parlance of our times.
2. Sorry about that y’all.
3. A slow, but very lightweight and sharp 18-55mm lens, with Image Stabilization
4. Yep, I see that Garrett Brown, the inventor of the Steadicam Merlin, recommends a 1-second drop time in that video. But I think I’ve gotten better results with a markedly less bottom-heavy setup, though it actually does make the device more difficult to balance at first.

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I was a first-time visitor to Hawaii recently, and shot a lot of photos and video. I’ll be dribbling it to my blog in bits and pieces as I go through the footage. Here’s a taste: a green sea turtle at Ho’okena Beach in Kona, Hawaii. This turtle popped up as I was snorkeling in deeper waters and swam alongside me all the way back in to shore. A beauty. Perhaps she was amazed to see a film/video editor out in direct sunlight?

Meandering tech notes:
Shot with a Creative Vado HD solid state 720p camcorder (1st generation)¹, in a Creative-branded Aquapac underwater housing.

The Vado HD is very similar to the Flip Mino HD and the Kodak zi8; I like it because it features a much wider-angle lens than its competitors. The Aquapac is basically a $30 very clear plastic bag with a watertight seal. Though this one’s branded for the Creative Vado HD, it’s probably large enough to fit two of them side-by-side². One one of my snorkeling adventures I brought along my Canon HV20 in a dive housing, and its remote control (to start and stop the camera’s recording) in the Aquapac alongside the Vado. I probably could have put my cell phone in there as well but didn’t trust the bag yet and honestly didn’t really want it along.

This turtle clip is from the 2nd day of my trip, before I’d figured out that if I squeezed out all the air in the Aquapac before sealing it, the plastic would remain taut over the lens, resulting in a sharper image. Less air in the bag also would have resulted in a tighter fit against the screen of the Vado HD, which would have given me a fighting chance of seeing the image on the Vado’s screen underwater –most of the footage I shot on the trip, including this turtle clip, was shot by blindly pointing the camera and hoping.

I snorkeled with the Vado in the Aquapac bag all week and had no problem with leaks. I was a little worried about this, but wasn’t risking much as the 1st and 2nd generation Vado HD go for $49 these days (B-stock of the 4Gb versions on Creative’s website as of 7/2010).

1. I’ve written up the Creative Vado HD previously here and here.
2. 3D anyone?

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So I bought the device and have tested it out. When I plugged a cable between its headphone jack and my car’s audio input jack and streamed audio to it from my iPhone, it worked a treat. It shows up in the iPhone’s bluetooth menu as a device named,”BCK-08″.

There are a few problems. The device’s built-in battery is pathetic, and within an hour or two of use it begins to beep every few minutes to indicate that the battery needs a charge. I also think the audio quality decreases in direct proportion to the battery’s charge, but am not positive about that.

My goal is to take apart this device, wire it to be powered directly from my car, and leave it permanently connected to the car stereo’s auxiliary input jack.

I’ve found a few resources on the net that may be of help:

• The data sheet for the chip used in this device, the ISSC IS1621N. I wish this PDF file were available to simply download. To have to view it in a flash-based viewer feels archaic, and overprotective for information the manufacturer should want to widely disseminate. I do see a button labeled “download” (in Chinese), but to download requires an account on the website and I don’t feel like jumping through account creation hoops in Chinese right now³.
• A page about the chip at its manufacturer’s website.
• The page of someone who has already taken apart the BCK-08 and is planning to do a similar project. He mentions a desire to get line-level output from the device. I think that’d be nice, though I notice no mention of a line out in the chip’s pinout, only an amplified headphone out.
• Wikipedia’s writeup of the LM317 adjustable voltage regulator, which is probably the part I’ll need to use to take my car’s 12V as input and supply 3.7V DC to the BCK-08.
• Or perhaps I could use this constant current-regulated LED driver⁴ to bring my car’s 12V down to 3.7V. It’s designed for high-power Cree LEDs, which take 3.7V input, so I’d guess it might be about right. Would save me some time designing my own circuit with the LM317, and it only costs $2.39.

1. I’m sure many other cars also have this feature.
2. The device’s full name on DealExtreme’s site is “Bluetooth 2.0 A2DP AVRCP Stereo Music Receiver and Handsfree (Black)”
3. I’ve been out of China for 3 years now and don’t feel like spending an hour fighting my way through the website with a dictionary in hand
4. Also from DealExtreme –how about that?

I grabbed her cell phone¹ and snapped a couple of pictures. He did the same. I don’t think he has a blog in which he posts photos of people in the act of taking his picture², but if he does you’ll now be able to find a photo of me on it.

1. It’s an iPhone 4G. I’m pretty impressed by its camera’s image quality. I don’t think I gave the phone enough time to properly set its exposure for that 2nd shot, there’s likely have been better highlight detail had I waited a couple of seconds.
2. which is something I’d definitely do if I were any sort of celebrity

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