Reducing Micro Jitters?

stinkpot

stinkpot

Well-known member
I can't seem to find a decent thread on this one but...

What are the best practices for reducing or eliminating the "micro-jitters" while shooting video with 7D? I'm sure setting the cam on a tripod does away with them but my best stuff is usually hand-held and I know this cam can be rough for that.

I've seen threads about removing it in post but man, I'd really like to avoid having to do that.

Any hints or tips will be appreciated!
 
Getting IS Lenses

Using a shoulder support, maybe adding weight to the shoulder support.

If nothing else, putting the camera up to your eye to add a third point of contact.
 
You can't really fix them in post because they affect the whole image. Run smoothcam or magic bullet steady over a micro-jitter clip, and you'll understand. The artifacts that micro jitters create affect the whole image.

The issue is a non stabilized lens on a light little DSLR body translates all of your hand jitters into the image. You can Hand hold an HVX and even turn OIS off, and still get a decently stable image, because of the weight of the camera.

But with a DSLR, you need to stabiize/add weight to the camera. Also, IS lenses really help. Wide IS lenses.
 
It's pretty much entirely a stabilization issue, yes, and awelgraven's recommendations are spot-on.

Another thing that wasn't mentioned is the no-budget trick of using the neck strap; attach the neck strap and hold the camera tightly away from you so that the neck strap braces it.
 
closing the last 5% is what I call it

its what Im trying to do

Often at a point of balance the hands seem to jitter while making their mind up

Its like starting and stopping pans - any acceleration - which is change in direction or speed

Ive learned a lot from being a newb steadicam-er teaches you a lot about even working on sticks

To me IS is ok for an attempted lock off - but you should shoot that on sticks anyway

The answer - im still searching - its either a balanced rig - in ALL axis - which is why I hang my camera under my rails and have the monitor high - so the rig is just a tad bottom heavy

Or its a specifically unbalanced rig - your body knows to push in one direction and does not jitter while deciding which way to go

And I reckon three and ONLY three point of contact - three points are always in a plane

this shot is shakey but not too jittery - I jitter when decellerating into the first lockoff - you see the horizontally balanced rig does not dip at the end of the whip pans

I can find a better balance point - I know it !

S
 
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Having run into this myself, I ended up getting a larger set of grips for my camera, kit 2 of this specifically:

http://www.idcphotography.com/kart/index.php?p=product&id=124&parent=31

And I was amazed at how much less jitter I had in my shots. I put BMX grips on the metal parts of the 3 grips and the camera works much easier since I've got an easier way of holding it. This along with the strap might make a good combo.

Without this setup, getting smooth movement of the camera was tough for me.
 
Woah... you guys aren't kidding! I took my Canon 85mm and shot a test just hold the cam and it was micro-jitter city. Then I tossed it onto my redrock rails/ff/etc rig all shoulder mounted (decent amount of weight)... and the jitters pretty much disappeared!

For me, this is great news cuz I love shooting shoulder mount. It's very organic (I know, I know, not everything can be shot that way - but it's my fav and i'll get creative to try to steer it in that direction - hehe).

Thanks for the examples! Kholi, I like those long lenses, nice footage. Morgan, I dig the steadi.
 
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