Turntable construction

A

AmyO

Well-known member
Hi there, I hope this is the right place to put this. It seems to be with all the DIY dollies and such I see here.

Anywho, I need to quickly and cost effectively build a medium sized turntable that can safely hold a child. It should be human powered and does not need to turn fast. It is for a shot in front of a green screen - head and shoulders most likely - where the subject is rotating to get a 360 view, to be composited into a computer graphic. I am really stuck as far as how to go about building this and what kind of parts I should be looking at. Once I get going with a parts list, I'm sure I could put it together no problem. Any advice for what kind of parts I should look at would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.
 
Just head and shoulders you say?

SR_139900Mid%20Back%20Office%20Chair.jpg


...also available as stools.


- Mikko
 
Great idea! :D Many chairs of that type can have their backs and arm rests removed as well, in case the child is too short.
 
Way to think outside of the box!! I totally have an office chair like that. And now I'm kicking myself for not thinking of it already. Can't beat $0 doing things on the cheap. Thanks so much. :)
 
I used a rotary turntable off a milling machine to rotate the eight foot model of the moon Io for the film Outland. Even installed seylsen drives on the camera and turntable so it only turned when the camera was exposing a frame. This eliminated that juttery look (like panning to fast).
 
Interesting? Did it actually turn while the camera was exposing or turn and then expose the camera? Was this done a frame at a time like animation or realtime exposure?

If you exposed while turning I suppose this would give you a bit of motion blur and make it more realistic.
 
Cool Lights said:
Interesting? Did it actually turn while the camera was exposing or turn and then expose the camera? Was this done a frame at a time like animation or realtime exposure?

If you exposed while turning I suppose this would give you a bit of motion blur and make it more realistic.
Click to expand...

Yeah that was the point. It rotated during the expouser and not when the camera was pulling down to the next frame. I was not there for the actual filming but I assume it was time lapse or at least a very low frame rate. It's at the start of the movie.
 
I was a Theater major in college and I remember them making a stage on top of the real stage that with stage hands and grips were able to push this thing around to reveal a new set for other scenes! Not sure if this is what you were looking for or not.
 
Shooter; care must be taken when building a revolving stage. I've seen a stage with 1/4-inch deep groves in circles out from the center of the stage about every foot becuse the stage couldn't take the non-rotating wheels of the set as it was turned. I'm prety sure the whole stage had to be re-floored. Oops.

It was a very good show though (Noises Off).

- Mikko
 
DVXShooter,
I don't really need anything that complicated or large. But, as a theater grad myself, I've been on a few builds with rotating sets and/or set pieces. Ah, the good old days.

Mikko,
I was crew for a community theater production of Noises Off. The set guy knew nothing about engineering and we all thought the sets were going to topple over each night at act break!

Anyway, I'm doing my greenscreen shoot tomorrow, so I'll let you all know how the chair worked.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top