How to Make a Camera Support System From a Child's Skate.

by cattan in Craft > Photography

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How to Make a Camera Support System From a Child's Skate.

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After my shoulder surgery I realized that i need it some sort of device to hold my camera. I was shooting sports so a tripod was out of the question.
To make things worse it was my right shoulder that was injured ( 98% of the cameras manufactured are design for right handed people.)

Anyway I started to look at photo catalogs for a solution. Mainly what I found was that I would have to spend $200 to $300 for a shoulder mount support, so I decided to see If I could make my own .



Teardown

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Materials
A kid's skate
A flash bracket (Preferably Metal)
A few bolts to hold everything together
Tripod head parts
Velcro straps
One sock
Foam
A wired remote control (the only item I bought about $28.00)

Tools
Allan wrench
power drill


The first step was to remove the wheels
Using a power drill I remove the rivets from the toe portion of the skate.



Building

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Next step we will insert a flash bracket that will serve two purposes.
It will be a handle and a base for the tripod head .
The flash bracket fit were the wheels were and it was secure with some bolts.

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I secure  parts from a minii tripod to the flash bracket.

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I filled the heel part of the skate with foam and added a sock to hold it together.
The remote was held in place with a Velcro strap.
This turn out to work better than expected I was able to follow the action and shoot using only my left hand.
I like it enough that I think I will be using it after i get my right hand back.