Bungee Cam Rig

Tim Nuttall · December 13, 2009

Hi all,

Looking to build a bungee cam rig on a Fisher 11 Dolly to hold an Arricam Lite. Probably can't get something smaller like a 235. Has anyone done this? Would like to cross the bungees in an "X." Thoughts on construction?

Thanks

ian mussell · December 14, 2009

Hi all,

Looking to build a bungee cam rig on a Fisher 11 Dolly to hold an Arricam Lite. Probably can't get something smaller like a 235. Has anyone done this? Would like to cross the bungees in an "X." Thoughts on construction?

Thanks

hi tim,

i've done this a bunch of times, simplicity is the best way! i use a spreader bar on top wide enough to keep to bungees away from the camera body. on the bottom plate use solid stand-offs of around 5" to keep a good centre of gravity with one bungee on each side of the camera.

on a fisher i always put a rotating off-set then a foot and a half of risers then a twin tube paddle mount and hang the bungee on the end, it works really well to keep the rotating off-set unlocked in shot for small moves left, right or in, out.

ian mussell · December 14, 2009

oh and of course remember to safety everything, i heard of a bungee snapping recently!

Jon Rosenbloom · December 14, 2009

We did this quite a bit on "Big Movie w/ Big Actors." Fisher 11 is not optimal; Fisher 10 is better. Arricam LT is not optimal; I've been humping that camera for three months, and it's freakin' heavy!

Read the rest with the understanding that I'm describing the other Dolly Grip's rig, so I'm a little fuzzy on the details.

Don't use bungees; use surgical tubing and as many risers as you can. The main thing is for the rig to be as high as possible so that you maximize the benefit of the tubes' elasticity (so the rig takes the weight instead of the operator.) We just make one big loop of maybe a dozen strands of five foot tubing.

(Again, I don't know the exact specs on the surgical tubing. It will be best if you experiment with tubes of various length, width and wall thickness. I do know that that camera weighs about 60 pounds with a prime and a 1000' mag.)

You also need a ubange, two carabeeners, a daisy-chain runner, a short runner, and a ratchet strap. The short runner chokes the camera's handle. One beener connects the short runner to one end of the loop of surgical tube. The tube runs up through the outer ubange hole, across the ubange, down through the other hole, and gets clipped with the other beener to one of the loops of the daisy-chain, which is attached to the leveling head. The ratchet strap braces the tower of risers once you've got the weight and the height.

Sorry I can't be more specific. Make sure to work out the kinks with a couple of sandbags before you rig the production camera.

Jon Rosenbloom · December 14, 2009

Or you could just do what Ian does.

Jeremy M Lundborg · December 15, 2009

I've seen the rigs around quite a bit recently and from my lack of experience I'd like to ask their importance.

What are they used for? Pros, cons?

Chris Keth · December 15, 2009

I rigged something like this recently to shoot out the side door of a moving van. The camera was hung on tripled or quadrupled bungees threaded through the loop part of the door latch. Then a couple more bungees were threaded through the baseplate and attached to either side of the bottom of the door so that the camera was suspended in the middle of 3 lengths of bungees. It made a surprisingly smooth car rig.

I don't know what shots you need to accomplish, so I don't know if this info will be pertinent. You might find that a heavy weight and a bungee going below the camera is helpful as well. The camera will be in a sort of tension stasis that smoothes your input into the system.

Jon Rosenbloom · December 16, 2009

Most of the time, a bungee rig is used for "hand held" shots when the camera is too heavy to be hand held; such as when an Arricam has the 12:1 zoom and a 1000' mag.

Chris Keth · December 16, 2009

Most of the time, a bungee rig is used for "hand held" shots when the camera is too heavy to be hand held; such as when an Arricam has the 12:1 zoom and a 1000' mag.

I see, it's not so much a stabilizer as a plain old weight relief system!

Saul Rodgar · December 16, 2009

I operated on a show last year where we were filming inside of a moving bus. At my suggestion, we hung the cameras with bungee cords from the overhead rails and the seats below and operated sitting on the bus seats. The director was sort of pleased with the resulting shots then --they were nixed later in post-- and we moved on to straight hand held camera work, which ended up being used in the edit.

Saul Rodgar · December 16, 2009

I operated on a show last year where we were filming inside of a moving bus. At my suggestion, we hung the cameras with bungee cords from the overhead rails and the seats below and operated sitting on the bus seats. The director was sort of pleased with the resulting shots then --they were nixed later in post-- and we moved on to straight hand held camera work, which ended up being used in the edit.

Forgot to mention we were using HDX900s.

Chris Keth · December 16, 2009

Forgot to mention we were using HDX900s.

What made you want the bungees with such handholdable cameras? To me, they would be a hindrance unless absolutely needed.

Tim Nuttall · December 17, 2009

I rigged something like this recently to shoot out the side door of a moving van. The camera was hung on tripled or quadrupled bungees threaded through the loop part of the door latch. Then a couple more bungees were threaded through the baseplate and attached to either side of the bottom of the door so that the camera was suspended in the middle of 3 lengths of bungees. It made a surprisingly smooth car rig.

I don't know what shots you need to accomplish, so I don't know if this info will be pertinent. You might find that a heavy weight and a bungee going below the camera is helpful as well. The camera will be in a sort of tension stasis that smoothes your input into the system.

Chris,

Do you have any pics of this rig? Reaching tension stasis is key for what we want to do.

Chris Keth · December 17, 2009

Chris,

Do you have any pics of this rig? Reaching tension stasis is key for what we want to do.

I'm afraid I don't. The camera was an arri 416 and we were shooting out the side door of a 15 pass van with the side doors strapped open. One bungee was looped twice through the top handle and the door hardware so the bungee was doubled up the whole way. The others were just looped between the rods and the dovetail plate and hooked onto whatever they could be hooked to around the bottom of the van door. It was very simple. The weight was mostly hanging from the top bungee with the others controlling excess bounce.

JD Hartman · December 23, 2009

Something like this: http://www.cinemagadgets.com/bungi-riser-mount-p-2276.html It's a MSE product: http://www.modernstudio.com/aboutus.html

michael best · December 30, 2009

I did a show last year where we had to make a bungie cam at the last second for a F35 with a 20-290 lens. We just took and eye blot, into the 3/8 receiver on the top of the camera, and used 4 or 5 bungee cords we borrowed form effects, and tied them to the dolly offset. Set the lenght we needed on the bungees and the Camera op loved it. He said it worked better then the normal Modern bungee rig people used. The only thing you need to worry about is the knots you use with the bungee, as bungee expand and shrink a lot which can slowly cause the knot to come undone.

as for the fisher 11 well if you can go with a 10 or a hybrid it would be better, but you can counter weight the 11 and support the arm with a piece of 2x4 or speed rail. And for a riser used a 3' or a speed rail riser to get you to the height you want.