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Hi, Tom wanted me to do a quick video this morning about a new piece of production gear
that we just got in. It’s a new tripod called the Cartoni Focus. But I think we should kind
of take it in the order of priorities. Once you have a camera that you are happy with,
we’re using the Sony Z1HD camera. And then once you have an audio set up, and we have
the Sennheiser wireless mics and a good lighting set up, I think those are your first three
priorities. Then after that, probably what you want to consider is making a purchase
something like this which is the Cartoni Focus, that’s C-A-R-T-O-N-I Focus tripod.
What it really comes down to is for most of you that are shooting Internet videos that
are just talking heads that are locked off, pretty much any tripod will work for you.
But once you start panning and tilting the camera or doing other kinds of videos that
are showing other kinds of exteriors or interiors where you’re moving the camera, you’re
going to want consider something probably a little bit nicer. What that really boils
down to is engineering.
So let me take you through the Cartoni Focus here just real quick and what makes it such
a special tripod. First off, the tripod has a quick release head, it’s got a snap function
here that allows you to pull it off and go hand held really fast. It’s got a quick
release balance plate on it. Snap it right back, it’s locked back in place.
The second thing that makes it really nice, it has a floating screw-on head, and that
head allows you to balance the camera and to get it leveled up. Right here, you’ll
see there’s a little circular leveler that allows you to put the bubble right in the
middle and relock the head.
When I was talking about engineering earlier what I meant was that most heads on very inexpensive
tripods, probably under $100 are what’s called friction heads. They just simply have
a screw somewhere around the head post that you tighten up and that’s how you pan and
tilt the camera. But it doesn’t supply any feedback to your hand to make a nice smooth
move either when you’re zooming in or panning or tilting.
How Cartoni handles that and how all professional tripods handle that is with what’s called
a fluid head. A fluid head actually means just that, the head has hydraulic fluid inside
of it and it provides feedback to the operator. This head has the ability to loosen and tighten
the drag. Right here, there’s a little switch where you can tighten and loosen the drag
to whatever your personal preference is. Also on the side, on the back here, they have a
balance *** that you can tighten and adjust the balance that lets you adjust how you want
the camera to sit when it comes to rest and your hands are off of it.
Additionally, it has a couple of other really nice features which is a locking mode here
when you walk away from the camera, and the same thing for the pan.
But mainly as I said, it really comes down to engineering. This tripod weighs just a
couple of pounds. It’s extremely light, extremely portable. As I said, the engineering
on it is phenomenal. You’ll see here just in the legs, when you’re packing up simply
pull up this lever, the whole tripod collapses, really nice feature. And again, this is what
makes it nice, great engineering, just a great tripod.
This tripod will cost you about $1,300 new. Actually, we found this one on eBay. We’ve
been keeping our eye on eBay for quite a while now trying to find one to come up and we actually
got this tripod for $800.
Tom wanted me to show you a couple of examples of what you’re up against when you’re
using an inexpensive tripod head. And it usually happens when you’re zoomed in tight and
you start to make a move, you’ll get a little hitch just like that. Then you can start to
move it down, and when you try to stop, you usually get a little bounce back.
Same thing as when you’re going back up, you see that little bounce there. Then when
you try to stop, you get a lag and it comes back in. That’s because you don’t have
fluid drag helping you give you feedback from the camera head.
Same thing when you go left or right, you get a little hop, it’s hard to start a smooth
move. If you’re trying to zoom out and make a move, you see how you get those couple little
bounces. Same thing when you’re zooming in, you get a little bounce there and a little
bounce when you’re trying to come over.
So that’s what a fluid head will do for you. It will keep these little bounces and
little bumps out of your moves. I think if you try the Cartoni Focus, you’ll be very
happy with your purchase.
Now we’re going to go outside and take a look at some beautiful pans and zooms, some
tilts, so you can see what you can actually achieve on a Cartoni Focus.
Here we are outside of Tom’s house shooting a few beauty shots. Here’s a nice pullback,
and here’s a nice little tilt down. You might see a little bit of a jitter there but
that’s just the 24 frame artifact. We’re shooting in 24 frames. And here’s a beautiful
sweet pan to the left. I actually only have one finger on the pan handle right now and
your seeing the fluid head from the Cartoni do all the work.
Once you get a great camera, once you get great audio and a lighting set up you like,
probably the next thing you want to invest in is a really nice tripod and we recommend
the Cartoni Focus.