The balance thing....

[Jason]

I've had an idea --- I'm going to buy another spirit level to attach to the camera at the top, and see if they both match, and if they don't, I will try to repair the rig to ensure BOTH are exactly level.

This way hopefully the rig may just balance dynamically.

I will let you know what happens and post some pics of how bad the results are.....

Jason

[Pascal]

Well, I'm fresh out of ideas getting this balance problem sorted out... I've constructed a different gimbal (keeping the same gimbal handle) used around 50 Euro's worth of new bearings, and the thing still doesn't stay balanced. You know the drill by now: balanced the sled with the lens pointing in one direction, then pan 180 degrees and balance is ruined again (big time!!)... The weird part is, the sled behaves exactly the same with the new gimbal as with the original one, so this might not be a gimbal problem but could have something to do with the sled itself. Just like Jason mentioned, I might try using a second spirit level to se if the sled is causing this imbalance...

Damn piece of crap

[Jason]

The thing I've found is that the post ISN'T level with the rig .... so it's probably causing the bad balance...I need to get a spirit level to find out, hopefully this week.

Jason

[Jason]

Right ... I have emailed Basson about the balance problem :

Hi Pablo,

I am sending you this email as I know of a few people on the Basson Steady Forum who seem to have the same problem as I do.

Trying to balance the rig totally is almost impossible, when you balance it facing forwards it will be ok, but when turned 180 degrees, it will lean over, and totally lose the balance.

As you may know this is very annoying and also very unprofessional for anyone using the rig in such an enviroment.

Do you have any suggestions/comments/solutions as to why it does this and what could solve it - I have been working on this problem since I got my rig (2 years now), and have only ever once had true dynamic balance once (with no monitor and battery attached).

I hope that this email arrives safely, as some of my previous emails were never answered.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Yours,

Jason Williams,
UK

Hopefully I will get a reply and hopefully a solution.

[Pascal]

Send us your faulty systems and we'll replace it at no charge what so ever, or you could order a Steadicam provid2+ at our expences!

Signed Pablo Plaul

And then I woke up....

I really hope they will take these problems seriously. I'm still replying e-mails from people who want to buy a Basson with a big DON'T DO IT!

[Jason]

Yes I agree ... my advice is always look around before buying from Basson .... cheap does mean cutting corners in this case.

[Jason]

Regarding the email I sent Basson - I haven't received a reply yet, but it's the weekend so I may get one this week sometime, but I've highlighted a small point from their Warranty information:

[Jason]

Well, I got a reply from Basson, on Monday so they've been very prompt. Here's their email:

Hello Jason:

The problem you mention is because this users are trying to do something that the steady does not need to do.
First if you have the steady on the stand it can not turn to the left or right more than 180degrees because the base will hit the focus stand, then if you have the steady on you it happens the same, second once you are wearing the steady your body will not be in perfect balance, this is also explained on other videos like "advanced steadicam techniques" do not come crazy with the balance, it is just to set the steady as close as possible to a good balance so there is no point on trying to make a turn of 360 degrees, to do this use a tripod, not a steady.
Second: Then if you are shooting to an object higher than you or lower than you, the sliding plate of the camcorder must be moved to the front or back as much as to leave the camcorder pointing to the object, this is a common mistake, because many users want to point the camcorder with the effort of the left hand and this is wrong, this is another prove that what you are trying to do is unnecessary.
Another thing that you should understand is, that at the bottom of the base you have a monitor on one side that weights probably a third than the battery that is on the other side of the base, so this makes very difficult to make a good balance to make a 180 degrees turn, so if you want to improve your turns you should compensate the loss of weight of the lcd monitor and ad some extra weight to the the side of the monitor. That is why you said you could make a good balance without battery and monitor.

Third: The most important thing on the balancing process is to do a good set up of the position of the bearing ring that is on the post.

So here it could be something that could also help you, maybe you are using the bearing ring in a position that makes very easy to make tilts with your left hand but when you do this anything can make the steady to loose balance, if your bearing ring is too light for your left hand, it can be proved very easy:
Just place the post over the docking bracket on the focus stand and then move the post in horizontal position after that hold firmly the handle with your left hand and leave the post free as shown on the demo video, if it goes vertical too slow it will be very hard to keep the steady balanced but it will be great for your left hand because it will be easy to tilt up and down, so it is better to do little more effort with your left hand while making tilts and keeping the steady balanced.
Another thing you may do to help you balance the steady is to use the post as much extended as possible.
I hope this help you to improve your future shoots,
Regards, Pablo Plaul
Basson

I've had a quick try of this and something feels different, it does feel a little easier, but it still leans when facing 180 degrees, but not to as bad as it was.

I'm going to fully balance the rig again, making sure the camera is dead centre and then work around the monitor and battery to get that the same.

Jason:)

[Pascal]

Well, the things he says are very obvious and will kinda improve the static balance of the sled, however this doens't solve the problem!
When I balance the sled with a 3 second droptime (standard with every other stabilizing system) it should stay level no matter which direction the lens is pointed.
"second once you are wearing the steady your body will not be in perfect balance"
DUH! No matter in what position your body is in, the gimbal is designed so that there are no movements translated to the sled. ergo it should stay level!
BTW ever noticed the arm post (end of the arm where the gimbal is placed on to) when the arm is not loaded and when the sled is mounted to it the arm post is in a completey different position than it was before. The way the arm's constructed it can not handle the torque and deforms...that way you keep fighting to have the sled stay close to your body...
Ever tried to keep a frame with a droptime of more than 3 seconds? It's very hard. Sometimes a shot asks for a tilt in order to have a nice frame, you can't rebalance the sled when the tilt is at the end of a long shot at eye level for instance.
"do not come crazy with the balance" It would be nice to have it balanced once, in order to shoot with the lens pointing foreward 'missionary' as well as 'Don Juan' . Somethimes you need to reposition your body to complete a shot, if you need to fight the sled from hanging off to one side you could very easily f*ck up the shot...
I could go on ranting about the shortcomings of the Basson, but I don't see what I gain from doing this... it's obvious Pablo or whoever at Basson, doesn't see the importance of user input, I don't believe they can carry on in this business with a system that has to many flauws, for very much longer...
I went to the homebuiltstabilizer forum with this problem and their conclusion is that the most important part of the sled isn't doing what it's supposed to do... And I do believe there are more skilled people on the forum (including engineers) than working in the Basson 'factory' !
I once setup a Handyman DV and I definately didn't have to worry about this stupid, time consuming balance problem, It's not possible to have this system dynamically balanced either, but that wasn't a problem. Nevertheless it's one of the more affordable stabilizers on the market....

I'll stop now :)

[Jason]

Let's hope Basson read and take note.

[Pascal]

I've calmed down a little ;)

I read this on the steadicamforum, and it concerns dynamic balance.

there's a manufacturer who builds a thing called a 'Mickey' basically this is a bracket with 2 inline skate wheels, you could use an inline skate upside down as well. What you do is secure the skate upside down in a lathe, then put the sled on 2 of the wheels just above the sled base and see if it rotates to either side, probably the battery will cause a rotation to that side. You'll have to try sliding the battery in or the monitor out to have an equal ammount of mass distributed on both sides. If this isn't possible (it's very likely this isn't) you should try to mount some kind of weight on the monitor side of the sled (could be on the sled base itself) You've done it right when the sled doesn't rotate around it axis, no matter what position it is in while on your McGyver Mickey. If this is the fact, you've dynamically balanced your sled! Yay!
Note, if you attach anything above the gimbal - could be some kind of focus device of some sort - is needs to be attached to the sled when doing this as well.
The 'Advanced steadicam techniques' video mentions the necessity of the camera position on the sled, this can be neglected. There's also a lot of math involved to have absolute perfect DB, but that's something when you got a sled that can do all of the things you need to do to get this (Steadicam Ultra, $60,000,-)

Hope this was of any help

The manufacturer of the Mickey gizmo:
http://www.baer-bel.de/Web/index2.htm

[Pascal]

Everything you allways wanted to know about dynamic balance. I warned you about the math, here you have it; totaly revised!

http://www.steadicam-ops.com/docs/dynamicPrimer.pdf

Have fun!

[Jason]

Well I think Basson have a lot to answer for ..... the rig doesn't work right - there's no excusing that. I intend emailing this thread to Basson so they can see the problems we are all having, I have put a spirit level on the top of the camera, and the post isn't aligned correctly, I have tried to straighten in but it's still pretty useless, I'll just have to get used to walking backwards.

Still trying to produce some decent shots, I need some more weight on the rig as it's just not heavy enough!

[steelej]

Guys,

Although I don't use a Basson system I'm always interested in finding out about all the different systems hence me visiting these forums. Hopefully I can help out a bit with this 180 degree problem. I use a glidecam V8 and I experienced the identical issue. I'd balance the camera one way then rotate 180 and it would tip forward. The reason for this is because all 3 axis are not meeting exactly in the centre of the Gimbal. What I had to do to fix the problem was to add a very thin washer to the fork of the yoke that was tipping when the camera was rotated. This problem can be caused because the manufacturing process isn't quite as accurate as it is when your sled costs £20k. So if the problem is the same as I had it can be fixed, I've been as happy as a pig in Sh@t since I made this modification, but it has to be said glidecam were brilliant with their help which doesn't seem to be the case here with Basson. I've enclosed a link to the glidecam central forum which explains the process of fixing this problem with a bit more detail and a picture from a user who has fixed the problem this way just so you can see where the washer has to go.

http://www.glidecamcentral.com/html/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=1

Go to page 2 where the explanation and picture are.

Hopefully this info will help.

John.

[Jason]

Thanks Steelej, I'm going to have a look now and see if it can be applied on my rig ... and will let you know how it goes.

Thanks

Jason

[Pascal]

Hi John,

Thanks for the info! I folowed the topic on glidecamcentral but didn't really think this was something that could work. I also read the topic on the steadicamforum where Igor discussed this problem, and saw that the reply with the answer came from James Livingston, who used to work at CP, if I remember correctly.
Well, I just have to give this a try and see if it solves the problem...
To bad that even Jason's e-mail to Basson didn't have the desired effect. The points mentioned in the reply doesn't solve the problem, and Pablo knows that.
Now to see if I can add shims between the yoke and panbearing housing, I believe there's quite a large gap in the Basson gimbal. My improv yoke doesn't have this so it might even work...

Anyway, thanks again for the effort!

[steelej]

It's definately worth a try, I couldn't believe it when I added this tiny thin washer and all my balance problems dissapeared, it's amazing that it was only out a tiny amount, but enough to knock off the balance.

John.

[Jason]

It's quite strange, but someone else mentioned the exact same thing to me ... I need to find some really thin washers to fit on, and that should sort the problem.

[Jason]

Here's a pic of the "micky" thing, it's really simple, two bearings mounted so that the post can spin, I have two free bearings somewhere, think I'll try and make myself one and get the damn thing sorted!

[jeek]

Hello I'm Jeek I am a photograpy and video student in switzerland and tomorrow I will make the wire transfert to bye the bnc 500 e3 with the 5,6 lcd monitor.

I've read your comments about the dynamic balance problems on the basson steady and I just want to know if I'm make a mistake if I buy Basson.

I don't know in which case of shoots you have this balance problems because I never have a steadycam before.

It is better if I buy a glidecam V8?

Please I have a rendez vous with the bank tomorrow so answer me as soon as you can

Thank you so much
P.S. sorry for my bad english, I speake french