I first purchased a used first gen Skyler Minicam and enjoyed it so much, I went out and purchased the latest model (then sold off the older one). It's a tiny little stabilizer that packs up small, performs excellently, and has amazing build qualities. Unfortunately it's a bit expensive compared to other stabilizers, so i'm happy to see another person like Carl Pendle from www.carlpendle.com using it. I'm not alone in this world..
This time Carl shows how to modify the Flycam Armbrace to fit the Skyler MiniCam for extended flight times. After the modification, he also shows a clever sling he uses to help him carry the entire weight, and stick around to the end for some fine examples of his Skyler Minicam in use. [Thanks Carl]. I have some additional information about the Skyler Minicam vs. Glidecam vs. Flycam (seen here) if you're still wondering what some differences could be.
For those who wanted a better look at the Flycam Armbrace, here's a quick little show and tell. The Flycam Armbrace
is used to help carry some of the weight of a stabilizer off the wrist. Glidecam also sells a Forearm Brace (seen here), but it's bit more expensive and looks like it will only fit on the Glidecam due to the larger OD on the post.
One common question is 'Does the Flycam Armbrace work with the Glidecam?'. The answer is 'YES' the Flycam Armbrace does work with BOTH the Flycam and Glidecam HD1000, HD2000, and HD4000 stabilizers. It uses a smaller OD on top and steps to a larger OD for the bottom of the post (as seen in the video). Coincidence? You be the judge. Using an arm brace will help relieve some weight from the wrist, but keep in mind that it will not solve the weight carried from the Bicep and the stabilizer will still be just as heavy. The Flycam Forearm Arm brace can be found via eBay (click here).
Flycam Forearm Arm Brace for Flycam and Glidecam HD Stabilizer
I get it. Sometimes you fly a stabilizer around and need to take a pause for a long static shot. These things can get quite heavy, so being able to stand on it's own could be beneficial for event shooters. Varizoom offers a Monopod / Stabilizer called the FlowPod (seen here), but when used as a stabilizer, it didn't really work out very well. Varizoom also makes a Crossfire Stabilizer (seen here) that doubles as a small Tripod too. None of them I think work very well, mainly because of the Gimbal setup they are using.
Wondlan also recently showed a Carbon Stabilizer that can be extended to work as a monopod, and they used a better Gimbal system like the Glidecam type stabilizers. I think they fell short a bit here because the sled was a little too small. If you think you need a stabilizer that doubles as a stand, here YouTube member NitsanPictures shows how it could be possible to modify your own with a Glidecam, and possibly even the Flycam by connecting to the 1/4" female thread under the post. It seems to work pretty good, but I think there are other Monopod designs that would make it easier to telescope when needed. [Thanks Nitsan] If you guys haven't seen a Glidecam Stabilizer in use, check out some of my old videos.
Many of you have probably already seen this video. It was posted up over a year ago as Part 1 of 2. I know i've had my eyes on it for quite a while waiting for the follow up, but Part #2 of this project doesn't look like it will happen anytime soon. This one is based on the Gimbal Handle that is used on the Glidecam series stabilizers. There seems to be a million ways to make a Steadicam Merlin gimbal handle, but little ways to make a decent Glidecam type gimbal handle. In this interesting video, there's some really nice techniques in mounting several bearings into some cheap PVC making it into a full 3 axis gimbal. It's been a year already, and there's some really good ideas in here to just let this sit back without being tackled by someone. Since video #2 hasn't been released to follow up on this, i'm curious if anyone has attempted this DIY project, and how far did you get?
Wow pretty overwhelming day already. Just received the Tiffen Steady Stick and the Glidecam HD1000 I posted about earlier. The Steady Stick isn't really anything fancy and pretty straight forward about how it works. I will run through some of the details of their build quality and features a little. The Glidecam HD1000 is really the one I want to dig into. It's much more expensive and quite large than say a Hague or IndieHardware (which i'm reviewing today), but it's just another option in the line of moving DSLR stabilizers I wanted to share with everyone. Hopefully i'll get these video reviews knocked out soon enough.
Skyler MiniCam Video Camera Stabilizer Kit
