XH-A1 + GlideCam 4000 [Help!!!]

[SaintDemure]

I can't for the life of me, balance my xh-a1 and the glidecam. Can anyone give me some tips on how to do this successfully? If you have a nice balance, can you give me the rundown on how to set this up? Number of weights to use and so on...

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks.

 

[henry cho]

i remember the first few tries can be hell, but it really isn't so hard when you get used to it. my rig is so loaded up with stuff that a tally on the number of weights i use would be meaningless, but there are some tips that should help.

have you checked out the 'stability of balance' video on the glidecam site? it's a good primer.

get a quick release adapter and put it on the camera plate. a long quick release plate on your camera will help as well (more room going front-back on the qr adapter). this will make your life a lot easier going forward.

load up the weight plates and keep the rig bottom heavy at first.

make sure the camera is in it's ready state (take the lens cap off, load the tape, put in the battery, extend the lcd, etc.) and slide the camera onto the qr adapter.

start taking weight plates off, performing macro adjustments as you go, until the rig just becomes slightly top-heavy. you'll know it just hits top heavy when the camera plate wants to fall past horizon). throw a weight plate back on each side of the bottom plate so that you're slightly bottom heavy again. (keep in mind a bottom heavy rig will always have the bottom plate fall below the camera plate. if the camera plate falls past horizon, you're still top heavy.)

now you should be able to tell what adjustments need to be made. if the rig is leaning towards the left, move the camera plate to the right. if the rig is leaning forward, move the camera plate back, etc. once you're pretty close, adjustments need to be tiny to get it to where it needs to be. we're talking millimeters here.

once your rig is balanced, you'll want to check drop time. around 1.5 seconds is a good place to start. the best and eaisest way to adjust drop time is by extending/collapsing the post. to make your drop time faster, extend the post a bit. to make it slower, go the other way and collapse it.

when you're happy with the drop time, you may need to be tweak the balance again as there may have been some rotation in the post while you were adjusting it.

if you find yourself getting frustrated along the way, take a break from it.

sorry if any of this was too rudimentary.