Gini K-5 DSLR Rig – Day 2: Tightening clamps and a nice surprise

My thumbs are a bit bruised
By Sol in Reviews

No real shooting today, but here are some notes from my 2nd day of testing this DSLR support rig.

Tightening Clamps

First, a bit on tightening clamps.  I’ve found that you really have to tighten the clamps down for them not to budge.  With a fair amount of tightening, they stay put fairly well, but I’ve found that a clamp here or there will shift when I put some leverage on it.  Bearing down on the clamp knobs will stop the wayward shifting, but your thumbs will pay the price.

It’s not that the clamps are low quality, but I think the sheer number of clamps– and thus axes to rotate on– can make it difficult to eliminate every potential shifting point.  Once you tighten one clamp down, the next loosest clamp will bear more weight and potentially shift.

More time with the rig will reveal whether this is a characteristic of the clamps on this rig, or if it’s simply something I have to acclimate to.

It feels a bit silly

Honestly, it does.

A day ago, I had a small camera, today, I have a big contraption composed of numerous knobs and rods.  I’m surprised to find that I feel kinda silly when I look at myself in the mirror holding this big hunk of metal.

While researching camera rigs, I was (and still am) afraid of losing my mobility and relative anonymity when out and about shooting video on the street.  I don’t think there’s any way I won’t be noticed when I take this thing out in public.  The goal though, is to find the right balance between enough gear to stabilize footage and not standing out too much.

I suppose that’s one plus of the more plastic-y looking rigs like Redrock Micro’s, which at least seem to be less conspicuous thanks in part to their matte finish.  The Gini K-5 is all shine and accented with red anodized knobs everywhere.

It’s also a lot of fun

I loved Legos as a kid and that’s what it feels like I’m “playing” with as I explore the various possible ways to configure the rig.  I’m enjoying sitting down and piecing together clamps and rods into something that works better than the last iteration.

A Nice Surprise

One of my primary uses for a camera rig was to provide stabilization when I go out and shoot random snippets of daily life.  For this, I felt that a small and stripped down rig was ideal. This is one of the reasons why I decided on the Gini K-5 rig, as it appeared that the various components could be reconfigured to give me something much simpler for shooting “around town”.  Some examples of simplified rigs are Zacuto’s Striker, Redrock Micro’s Nano Running Man, and Cinevate’s Simplis Solo.  Basically, you get one handle, a gunstock or chest pad of some kind, and a few clamps and rods to tie it all together.

By repurposing the various components (such as using the top carrying handle as a shoulder brace), I arrived at a configuration that I liked quite a bit.  Even with just one handle, it the “Sniper” rig (as I’ll refer to it) felt quite balanced and comfortable.

There was just one problem.

The camera baseplate that comes with the Gini K-5 is pretty heavy duty, which can be a problem when you want to strip down as much of the weight and physical presence from the rig as possible.  As of last night, I thought my only hope was to pick up a Gorilla Plate from Zacuto, though at $70 just to simplify my rig, I wasn’t too keen on this.

Then this afternoon it hit me– what about the monitor arm?  The K-5 comes with an articulating monitor arm that is basically a clamp with a ball joint on each end.  One end has a 15mm stem that will fit into any of the clamps and the other end is a 1/4-20 screw for a monitor to be mounted on to.  I don’t have a monitor (yet?), but it just so happens that tripod mounts on cameras also accept 1/4-20 screws.

A bit later, I had an awesome streamlined camera mount for my “Sniper” rig.  In fact, I think it’s better than the Gorilla Plate I was eying because it’s articulating, so I can position it any way I want.  The 15mm post is also long enough to give me a decent amount of height adjustment should I want it.  I was watching an auction for a used Gorilla Plate on eBay, but I don’t need it now (right?)!

This discovery was a nice surprised because I had basically resigned myself to the idea that I would have to make do with the standard Gini camera baseplate until I got my hands on a Gorilla Plate.  Now I can fully test the feasibility of this stripped down rig when I do some shooting tomorrow!