Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

GROUP BUY - eMotimo ST4 + Dana Dolly

Hey Pedro,
Great write up and a perfect accelerated journey through many of the challenges users will face. Thanks for taking the time.

From the ground up, stability with motion control and dollies is a much different animal than with manual shots. With manual shots, all of the acceleration/deceleration forces are coming from a person and flow through their arms, torso and legs. With motion control all of the acceleration/deceleration forces flow through the belts, and stands / apple boxes. The heavier the load, or the higher the acceleration, the higher the force. This force pushes and pulls the Dana Dolly / stands in line with the rails. Our supports need to be able to take some significant forces in short burst without moving, and if is does move slightly have anything damp out quickly.

So in short, when moving to motion control and getting clean shots, everything matters a bit more on setup. We are compiling tips and tricks like these to help users get the most from their rigs from day 1.

From eMotimo's side, we want this rig to be outstanding for everyday interviews, tabletop shooting, VFX and timelapse. We are also excited to keep pushing the limits. In our R007 firmware that we have in late Beta now, we have a turbo mode that is meant for 24 volts only that really gets you moving, but also puts lots of force on the supporting rigs and can exacerbate any support issues that already exist.

We try to walk a fine line of letting users experiment and find the limits, and nannying our speeds to enable it to just work well for everything. I think that having and Easy Mode (Mike's idea) and Advanced modes to protect bread and butter daily shooters from getting out of bounds too quickly can help.

We would be excited to have a CINEMILLED aftermarket solution for mounts. Let's chat!

Also, Phil has been reaching out with a link to forms for those that have signed on to start the ordering process. We have received 22 so far so there are about 1/3 of you sill need to spend the 2-3 minutes to complete this! Please take a few and finish it out. We will start sending out invoices early next week. We have a little bit of work to add in the extras that many of you are requesting.

Also, we are about to start talking through our next interface that addresses extremely complex key framing, imports exports of moves to other software, and some extras. We are doing a bit more due diligence, but expect something mid to late next week.

Best regards and happy Friday:
Brian
 
Last edited:
Have a shoot coming up that's pretty VFX heavy, and am seriously considering jumping in on the group buy. However, there were a few questions I had about this system. (they were asked a few pages ago, but I didn't see an answer posted)

1) Is the unit able to handle a rig on a slope/angle. If so, how severe of a slope can it handle?
2) Is there a way to rig the system to be able to handle curved track?
3) Are the programmable moves scale-able? Like if I needed to shoot miniatures on a green screen, and then background plates in the real world. Is there an easy way to scale-up the move that I do on the miniature, so that I can keep the same relative motion in the real-world background plate?
 
I had the opportunity a while back to play with the eMotimo head and it's a great piece of kit. If you're buying just the ST4, I'd strongly advise you get a VERY sturdy dolly system like the Dana Dolly or something like that. Smaller, lightweight sliders just don't keep the rig stable enough, and you'll get wobbles all day long, which isn't the fault of the head, but the slider itself.

Kudos Phil for setting this up...I wish I could jump in on this, but I can't at the moment.
 
Nathaniel Haban said:
Have a shoot coming up that's pretty VFX heavy, and am seriously considering jumping in on the group buy. However, there were a few questions I had about this system. (they were asked a few pages ago, but I didn't see an answer posted)
1) Is the unit able to handle a rig on a slope/angle. If so, how severe of a slope can it handle?
2) Is there a way to rig the system to be able to handle curved track?
3) Are the programmable moves scale-able? Like if I needed to shoot miniatures on a green screen, and then background plates in the real world. Is there an easy way to scale-up the move that I do on the miniature, so that I can keep the same relative motion in the real-world background plate?
Click to expand...

1) This setup with Dana Dolly is meant for level or nearly-level track only. Any significant rises would require a counter balanced system.
2) We are belt driven which requires straight track. Many of the needs for curved track have been for managing framing and focus which are addressed by keyframing pan/tilt/focus. Of course circular moves are not possible and wrap arounds effect is limited.
3) Not onboard currently. Great question for our next interface - stay tuned please on this one
 
Hi,

How Can I Speed up The process to ship To the uk Asap?

Have an upcoming Music video I'd really like to use this on.

Craig Lees
UK
 
Craig Lees said:
Hi,

How Can I Speed up The process to ship To the uk Asap?

Have an upcoming Music video I'd really like to use this on.

Craig Lees
UK
Click to expand...

Hi Craig,

It's my understanding that the Group Buy can't be sped up, but if you are like Pedro and need something right away you are welcome to reach out to Hot Rod Cameras directly and we can see about getting something shipped out to you immediately.

To my knowledge, Hot Rod has been working with eMotimo longer than any other dealer and my team has a high degree of technical competence should you run into any questions during the initial set-up.

Kind regards,

I.
 
Phil should have my form a week ago but since my RedUser just got re-upped... ST4+DD thx!
 
Thanks Illya but I'm in the UK so I can wait all good cheers!

Craig Lees
UK
 
We've got our eMotimo Monday for a gig thursday and friday with an Alexa mini and prime lenses.

So far the system is working great out of the box, I took us approximatively an hour to be up and running the first time so with experience it should get really fast.
Programming movement is insanely simple and they accurately repeat. We've done a ping pong mode for more than 2 hours and the movement was still much the same.

As for comments, I join what Pedro said in his review :
-The arca mount seems a bit limited for larger camera packages
-We've also observed some minor vibration/move at longer focal length. We wen't up to 100mm to see how much we would get.
-Stripping the camera as much as possible is definitely better
-Finding how to get the best tension in the belt can be tricky
 
Benjamin Granet said:
We've got our eMotimo Monday for a gig thursday and friday with an Alexa mini and prime lenses.

So far the system is working great out of the box, I took us approximatively an hour to be up and running the first time so with experience it should get really fast.
Programming movement is insanely simple and they accurately repeat. We've done a ping pong mode for more than 2 hours and the movement was still much the same.

As for comments, I join what Pedro said in his review :
-The arca mount seems a bit limited for larger camera packages
-We've also observed some minor vibration/move at longer focal length. We wen't up to 100mm to see how much we would get.
-Stripping the camera as much as possible is definitely better
-Finding how to get the best tension in the belt can be tricky
Click to expand...

Interesting to hear. Quick curious questions for me. How heavy was your payload? I've loaded up to 20lbs and still was able to get smooth moves. That was more of a stress test, but I would say up to 15-17lbs is doable. I agree with the stripping down aspect, but balance to me is much more important.

I've been able to use up to 135mm stable thus far, but the track was on apple boxes and both sides were sandbagged down. My payload was in the 12lb range at that point with the battery on the ST4.

The only tip I have on the belt tension is line up by eye a "straight path" from the clamps to the motor gear. Once there, when you engage the clamps, pull taught by hand then make sure the clamp slide is in the closest to camera position and slide that back with your thumbs as you tighten down.
 
Phil Holland said:
I agree with the stripping down aspect, but balance to me is much more important.
Click to expand...

+1. Having spent a lot of time manually balancing systems for a use with a Glidecam the easiest way I've found to get balanced is to gently roll the fully rigged camera on a pen on top of a table until you find the balance points (forward/back and side/side), and then mount that center as close to the center of the operating setup (in this case the DD center) as possible. Often this will appear "off center" visually, so it may seem counterintuitive, but it'll be a lot smoother because it's one less thing for the motors to fight. Don't have my ST4 yet so I can't see how easy this is going to be to achieve, but some kind of plate in between the DD and the ST4 head that allows you to position the setup based on the rig/lens might be useful.
 
I apologize if someone already asked this, but I need the ST4 + DD for a gig next week. Is there a way to pickup in the Los Angeles area or is this a "shipping only" purchase?
 
RyanFrancis said:
I apologize if someone already asked this, but I need the ST4 + DD for a gig next week. Is there a way to pickup in the Los Angeles area or is this a "shipping only" purchase?
Click to expand...

Just pinged Brian to see what's possible, but do bear in mind that this group buy isn't finished until the 27th. Let's see what he can do though for your specific case.

At the moment everybody except for 12 people have filled out the form. You aren't required to do so until the end of the group buy, but if you can fill out that form sooner than later it would help eMotimo and Dana Dolly out a bunch in terms of planning out what they need to make.
 
Phil Holland said:
Just pinged Brian to see what's possible, but do bear in mind that this group buy isn't finished until the 27th. Let's see what he can do though for your specific case.

At the moment everybody except for 12 people have filled out the form. You aren't required to do so until the end of the group buy, but if you can fill out that form sooner than later it would help eMotimo and Dana Dolly out a bunch in terms of planning out what they need to make.
Click to expand...



Thanks Phil! Please let me know what he says. If I could get the ST4 and DD in my hands on the 27th at the latest, that would be incredible.
 
Phil Holland said:
To the GB'rs, still awaiting word on the a Dana Dolly only option, but again this is primarily an eMotimo kit deal. Don't think the basic kit is an option rather than the universal rental kit either, but also still awaiting word there.
Click to expand...

Hi Phil,

Any update on DD Only option. Either case , please let us know.

Thanks
Uday
 
Chris McKechnie said:
I had the opportunity a while back to play with the eMotimo head and it's a great piece of kit. If you're buying just the ST4, I'd strongly advise you get a VERY sturdy dolly system like the Dana Dolly or something like that. Smaller, lightweight sliders just don't keep the rig stable enough, and you'll get wobbles all day long, which isn't the fault of the head, but the slider itself.

Kudos Phil for setting this up...I wish I could jump in on this, but I can't at the moment.
Click to expand...
Has anyone tried this system on say a MYTWorks medium 4 footer?
 
Many thanks Pedro for your excellent preliminary thoughts on the emotimo. Although not directly responding to my questions you have answered many of my concerns.
I had to use a DC slider for a job last year and despite using mathews slider stands, every sandbag I own, stripping the camera to only essentials, returning to rent their moco unit, repeating each shot many times and using a variety of stabilisation software in every program I own I was still not totally happy with the fluidity of my shots. To an uncritical eye the shots were probably ‘fine' but not to me.
It seems from yours and and Phil’s experiences that it is probably possible to get really smooth shots with this setup particularly with some experience and tinkering.
Brian many thanks for your thoughts on stability and also great to hear that you are developing a new interface that will allow really complex key framing. As the interface stands now is it possible to alter the ease going into and out of separate keyframes? I agree with Nathaniel it wold be great to be able to scale moves both spatially and temporally.
Finally does anyone have any other workflow tips for using the system and in particular what post stabilisation software are you using. I currently have Media Composer, After Effects and Premiere and found that using techniques in all three programs, sometimes on the same shot was my best bet. I would be willing to invest in specific plugins/ software to really fine tune my shots.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top