The VERY poor man's DIY Skater Dolly

I saw that thing at Home Depot also but was afraid it was too small. I also wanted rigid wheels that don't pivot so I could turn the wheels so it could travel on set paths. Your tripod head looks massive on that thing. Can you tell us if it's working for you? If the footage looks just as good or better that's another good find.
 
zipper1022 said:
what kinda camera mount is that?
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It's the head off of my Sachtler DV II tripod, which uses a bowl head. I took the screw I use to mount the head to my stickypod and picked up a couple more in that size. The "dolly" had a hole in the middle already so I was able to screw the head right onto it.

Bao--the footage is decent. I'm still making a skater based on your design, since I want to control the wheels' axes as well. This little piano mover would probably work well in tight spaces, and it gets some cool super-low creature-type shots, but for smoothness I'd go with the inline skate wheels on a wider base. I do like how small it is, I can just pop it in my camera bag if I'm in a hurry (usually I load up way more equipment than I need anway, but still). Also, being able to steer it with the arm on the tripod head is nice and once it's going in a certain direction it keeps on so it'd be fairly easy to do a slow straight move as well. It's cheap, it's easy, but it's not really a skater. Call it a "head dolly," I guess.

EDIT: it's a little bit noisier than skate wheels also.
 
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Nicely done HappyGobo. With that triangular shape you might be able to stick your tri-pod on there for some higher shots. Paint it black and it's worth a thousand bucks.
 
Bao Q. Nguyen said:
Paint it black and it's worth a thousand bucks.
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Ain't that the truth. I was looking at someone's DIY mattebox and it looked terrible; the bare metal showed all the sanding marks, etc. I was shocked when I saw the painted version because it looked completely professional.
 
this actually looks great i'm a begginer but if you ask me , i would bet that at the end of the day if you get the shot how you invisioned it in your head then your working with top class equipment..... good luck
 
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