By site editor Dan Chung:
One criticism I’ve had of many shoulder rig designs is that they are over-engineered for use in news and documentary work. Many are too heavy, poorly balanced or have too many protruding bits to be practical.
My bare Canon C300 is great handheld without a rig for short periods, but when I am doing all day shoots what I look for is a rig that replicates a conventional ENG camera design. I have previously tried the Zacuto recoil rig and while it is very comfortable, it is just too bulky for a lot of the work I do – I think it is better suited to narrative work. I want something that is comfortable for long periods and I can jump in and out of vehicles with.
Enter the C-Shooter.
A relatively simple design, it combines the new ENG Grip Relocator (a version of the original Zacuto C300 Grip relocator that attaches direct to a rig’s twin rods) with a Studio baseplate, shoulder pad and a counterweight.
The grip relocator is key to making the whole thing work. The Canon original handgrip is moved off the side of the camera and down onto the rig, with a short cable allowing it to control the camera as if it were still attached. I have used the original for a while and truly love it; the new version looks even better for my needs.
Will this rig replace my current Frankenstein Zacuto/Movcam/Redrock/Genus C300 rig? I am certainly going to be testing it out at NAB 2013.
The C-shooter is available now from the Zacuto webstore starting at $999 US.
This from Zacuto’s website:
The C-Shooter is a quick, easy shoulder mounted rig for C100/300/500 users. The kits centers around our Studio Baseplate for Canon C100/300/500 cameras (standard 3/8 16 and ¼ 20 tripod mount underneath) with 12″ rods. The rods can slide back and forth to accommodate different lenses and accessories by turning the red levers at the side of the plate. Our comfy shoulder pad also slides on the rods for comfort and ease of use. A 3.5lb weight sits behind the shoulder pad for counterbalance. This handy little kit creates as close to a typical ENG size set up as you can get for your C100/300/500 camera. It’s the best of both worlds!
Attached to the front of our rods is our ENG Grip Relocator for the Canon C100/300/500*. The Canon removable camera grip attaches directly to our Grip Relocator and our exclusive cable connects to the port on your camera. Once its plugged in, users have trigger or on/off control, lens aperture control, and a programmable function button that can be set to a number of things including waveform, 1 to 1 zoom, zebras, my menu, and many more. The cable is 24″ long.
Want to add a follow focus? Check out this kit. An EVF could be attached with our Standard Mount directly into the side of the baseplate.
* The Grip Relocator can also be used with the C500. However, the C500 camera does not come with the Canon Grip. You must purchase that separately from Canon.
This website is affiliate of Zacuto
