The Best Way to Buy Equipment | Behind The Scenes

This week we test out a Zhiyun Crane Plus and talk about how we have bought equipment over the years.

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Phife for Life - Otis MDonald

[tested]

Great video, and good practice in trying and buying gear! (Joey)

[ThinkingArtEntertainment]

Might have to grab one of those Neewer lights for my vids!

[mcdrobert]

Its amazing how different the style of the video becomes when you start moving about.

[sagekrening]

GIMBAL TIP: I did a lot of marching band in high school and applying the same techniques I used then really helped. The entire purpose of marching is to walk as smooth as possible as not to affect your tone while playing an instrument, similar to avoiding camera shakes. There are different techniques for marching forwards, sideways, and backward. All of them have proven to be equally useful to me. I haven't looked, but I'm sure there's plenty of tutorials on YouTube of how to do it.

[chadwin]

Been using the crane for a while now and love it!! I’ve made a couple videos about creative ways to use it. ALSO, I made the Exact same switch from the Rebel T3i to a7s a few years ago.

[ToastedSynapseGaming]

I also have a 200 LED from ebay. I checked the color accuracy, very good. No need to upgrade to an F7 or something.
I also constructed my own shoulder rig out of aluminium flash brackets and I can't bring myself to changing it, because the camera sits in the front, next to my hands and I find it very convenient to hold it with the right hand while my left is on the lens, or the left hand while my right is checking menus and stuff. I find the separation of the other popular rail-based shoulder rigs to be cumbersome for me.

[jw_film]

Best piece of kit I've got in terms of bang for buck has been the Aputure Magic arm. It is absolutely rock solid and easily holds my ninja blade with two Sony npf batteries. Another great buy is Velcro cable ties. Strong and much easier to use than traditional ones.

Worst equipment purchase? A 77mm nd from a company called Codio - it was total garbage

[HackMyControlSystem]

I love the final product resultant of a Zhiyun, but loathe balancing it.

[NatesFilmTutorials]

I had the $50 Neewer light, fell off a stand and broke in 2 days. Probably my worst puchase was the Go Pro 5, those cameras dont hold there value long. Best purchase... 5 in 1 reflector!

[elliothartleyuk]

Hey guys THANKS SO MUCH FOR SUBSCRIBING TO MY CHANNEL!
It means the world to me!

[polarisworks]

You forgot about sound ;-) A good wireless mic is a good investment.

[Larslarson]

Does your titla cage fit on the smallrig shoulder mount?

[vikky_rathore]

Record button could be a pain in the butt on these Motorized Gimbles.

[vegardpedersen]

I also use smallrig. The Zhiun Crane is awesome, I am going to buy the new DJI Ronin S! I actually have a video on my channel about a gimbal, actually it is the only video on my channel yet. It is a two handed gimbal, but it's almost the same with one handed gimbals. Ignace aleya has a great video about creative gimbal movements :-)