Car mount

dougspice

dougspice

Veteran
Anyone have any advice for a nice, cheap, stable car mount for the DVX? Specifically over-the-hood rather than through-the-side.
 
I have one from filmtools.com. It cost about $150. It's basically a giant suction cup that can be used on the hood, windshield, side fenders, etc.
 
There's another post on this site where Barry (i think) stated he used the cinesaddle strapped on top of a car with great results.

Personally, I use a piece of plywood with a hi-hat on it. That way you change frames for different characters without resetting the rig. As far as securing it, it's layed over furny pad (furniture pad) and the 2x2 plywood had hole drilled through it that i slip rachet straps through to secure it. Of course, this only works well on smooth asphalt roads.

For window mounting, I ad l-brackets to the plywood so it lays over the open window, and strap those the interior car door handle. The exterior is part is supported with a combination of grip clamps, cheap extension poles from home depot that are used by painters, and suction cups.

For interior of car low angles I just use sand bags.

A cool shot for convertibles is setting the camera on a tripod on the hood, very well staped of course, at full height looking down onto the characters. Of course you're very limited with shot in regards to time of day and angle of sun in ragrds to street you're on.

You get a lot of attention from other drivers when you do this, and you also run the risk of a ticket or larger fine for shooting without a permit, if you don't have a permit that it.

Bear in mind that if you have student ID you can often get permits for free or very cheap. I've been on gigs where the producer got a $500 fine and we were shut down, and that's not fun.
 
i went sort of all out and bought the flimtools 3 point car mount. It is excellent! So good infact when mine was stolen ( thieves didn't know what they were stealing though, cuz they dropped a bunch of pieces off it * thieves DIE ) I bought another.

this thing NEVER leaves my sight now.
 
Sean Michael said:
I have one from filmtools.com. It cost about $150. It's basically a giant suction cup that can be used on the hood, windshield, side fenders, etc.
Click to expand...

Thats the mount I lost my DVX with.
 
Walter,

Was that the Woods 6" with Bogen mount on top? I know a lot of the Widgets mounts use multiple Woods suction cups, but I've not heard of one coming loose before. That sucks. Uh, well... I guess it didn't suck - er, you know what I mean.

Hope the prod. insurance picked-up the tab on that one.

e
 
The camera was not insured. We never added it cause it was so cheap and just didn't bother. The problem was less the mounts fault and more the guy who used it and didn't secure the mount correctly or use safeties.
 
ooh yeah that sucks... I haven't used my saftey strap yet just the 3 cups while keeping a carefull eye on them and haven't had a problem with it yet.
 
I actually ended up getting one of the Wood's Gripper systems as well... the one with the plunger/red line system which I feel fairly secure about. Anyway, I shot from just off the front tire, about 6 inches above the road, going about 50mph/35 through a turn, and it held just fine. A little terrifying, but it was fine. Actually I should export that shot and post it here.
 
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