Any help would be so very much appreciated. I have been at this for 4 hours and I am actually further away from achieving good balance than from when I was only 15 minutes in. I'm pulling my hair out here. I read the manual twice. I read the quick start guide. I watched the 15 minute M5 tutorial - 10 times. Here are my problems: I am trying to balance a Red Epic with side handle. I have no cable for my red touch LCD to I have to use a smallHD monitor attached by a micro thin (consumer) HDMI cable. 1. I tried to balance the camera with the cable attached, unsuccessfully. It seemed to pull on the camera no matter how much slack I gave it. (Note: I balanced the M15 with the cable attached - should I have balanced the camera first, then attached the cable????? 2. I abandoned the idea of the HDMI cable all together and decided to go wireless from a Paralinx transmitter and battery and receiver crudely velcro'd the combo to the back the the Red to go wireless to the receiver velcro'd to the back of the monitor on the handlebar - as seen here: Now this is where I ran into some major problems. 1. Once I got balance on fore/aft, then I would try to get balance for tilt, but was unable to because the lens would rub against the top motor on the gimbal as seen here: 2. I moved the entire cage down as low as it would go to make room for the lens, and was able to achieve tilt balance, but then the entire thing went completely out of balance - fore/aft was off again, tilt, roll - everything. So I started over. Got fore/aft right, got tilt right, but now the lens rubs the top motor again and when i set it normally in inexplicably pans left and stay there. If I pan it right, it pans left again, as seen here: What am I doing wrong? Any help would be very much appreciated.
Don't worry about the lens hitting the pan motor when it tilts up. Just protect it from hitting it abruptly as to not damage it, but realize it won't ever need to go that high during operation, so it won't be an issue. Balance is more important. It sounds like moving the camera down caused the pendulum effect messing up everything thing else. Slide the whole camera back up to vertical tilt center and you should be good. Again, protect that lens using your hand and you can still balance that axis.
Hello, I think you need to go 1 axis at one time first. Second id does not matter if the lense can go up 90 deg since you will never shoot like that. First thing is that you put all the stuff that you need on the camera. Then install it on the gimbal. Then you center the roll and tilt so its stable and in in rouogh COG. After you did that you tilt the camera 90 deg up or down and check where it will try to go on its own. Move the whole camera on side rods until it is stable in center. So that it is not bottom or top heavy. THen go with roll and tilt again until it is perfect. Pan is the easy part. Forwards and backwards until you are done. It is important where you install additional accessories since the load should be on center off the camera , not front or back heavy. Hope this helped.
Carey have you watched the videos over on the Freefly Systems website? As Dejan points out it is one axis at a time.
Thank you all. Yes, I've watched the vids, and will again. I just got frustrated when I tried to balance the camera with the Micro HDMI cable attached. Would it be better to balance the camera, then plug in the HDMI cable? Also, if the lens hits the top, how can I be sure I have tilt balanced? Can I point the lens down to test that? Thanks!
You can test the tilt balance by either pointing down, as you mentioned, or by pointing up without going all the way up. Usually only around a 45 degree angle is necessary to determine how far off the tilt CG is. And I would recommend keeping the cable plugged in during balancing. May I ask which HDMI cable you have? As it seems you have figured out, thin cables are not necessarily flexible. One of the best ones out there is the Sanho HyperThin (http://www.adorama.com/SHT08BK.html...=38589028051&gclid=CJu8-MThwMECFa1aMgod8SwA6A). There are others, but sometimes you never know how flexible it is until you get it in your hands. If the cable stiffness is giving you major issues, then just unplug it until you're done. You shouldn't have to, but it won't hurt your balance too much since it's not that heavy.
Carey, I know the trouble you're going through with testing the two different units you have (I'm following your other threads on RU), and the last thing you need is trouble with the little things. If I can help you via Skype or FaceTime please let me know. I'd be happy to help.
Thanks Austin. I'm in bed with the flu, but may need to take you up on that in the coming days. Do you sell Flexible Red Touch Cables? If I can get one overnighted, that might be the best solution. Let me know, thanks again!
One step at a time. The HDMI won't affect it too much so if it helps, leave it off and practice balancing. You can always plug it in last then you will only have to move the camera forward a touch. If the lens is hitting when you point up, just go the other way and point it down. And as Austin points out, you rarely would ever tilt that much anyways.