GEAR. TRIPOD OR MONOPOD?
if you’re at an event where you don’t have the time and space to set up a tripod and you’re shooting at low shutter speeds. I have seen people shoot video with them but you do need a head or you won’t be able to adjust the shot at all. A monopod with a good head on it can be very handy. You can use it to get some very quick and simple moves, just by tilting the monopod and the head at the same time. But the use of these set-ups for video productions is very limited.” Camera operator Darren S Cook agrees, highlighting the positives and negatives of shooting video with a monopod. “For me, monopods are a bit of a battle,” he explains. “My DOP Neil Phillips had one so I used it on a motor-racing documentary that I’m filming called Believe and Achieve . It’s about disabled racing drivers.” Cook says it was very useful when trying to get into tight areas – such as a shot he was attempting to capture with two racing drivers, one of which was in a wheelchair, inside a small garage with six crew members squeezed in. “It’s quite a clever piece of kit – and the fact it’s got a fluid head on it is a massive bonus,” he adds. “But it didn’t help me out as much as I’d hoped, because in getting in there and trying to set it up, I missed the shot. A lot of the time I’m on a gimbal or a handheld, so I’m much more used to those.” THREE-LEGGED FRIEND Geraint Evans, a DOP whose credits include All that Glitters: Britain’s Next Jewellery Star for BBC Two, says that he tends to prefer the three-pronged variety. “I’ve been using the same tripod for 15 years. If I’m not using that, I’ll opt for an Easyrig, which puts the weight of the camera on your hips instead of your shoulder,” he explains. “It’s a handheld device that lets you hold quite a heavy camera without it killing you.” While tripods are more common than monopods when it comes to filming, when Merritt joined The Repair Shop team, tripods were
Sachtler Designed for documentary, corporate or news applications, Sachtler Aktiv fluid heads speed up balancing, removing or attaching the head with unique Speedlevel and Speedswap technology. Levelling takes place on the head itself, with a simple lift-and-clamp lever, so operators don’t need to bend down to adjust the balance, and their hands stay close to the camera. Clear confirmation that the camera is level comes from the illuminated Prismbubble – the design creates two bubbles that can be seen clearly from the side, above or below the camera position. At the press of a button, the prism lights up, as well as the pan and tilt tension mechanisms, making the system easy to use at night or in low-light conditions. The Aktiv head combines with Sachtler’s Flowtech tripod to create a versatile solution for fast-moving filmmakers.
conspicuous by their absence. “Everything was handheld,” he recalls. “My first set-up on my very first day was 2.5 hours, filming on the end of a 70-200mm lens – and it was awful. When Covid-19 arrived, all the cameras went on tripods for expert and contributors’ sequences because I wanted nice, steady shots and we needed to film at distance.
“A monopod with a good head on it can be very handy. You can use it to get some very quick and simple moves, just by tilting the monopod and the head simultaneously”
58. DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM
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