DSLR Stabilization is a must and the Answer is from Texas

Creating beautiful filmic images is one of the dreams for every video professional, but one of the largest drawbacks that almost every DSLR is that it is to lightweight and is to hard to stabilize on its own.

What that means then, is that you either have to shoot every shot on a tripod or you have to learn how to hold a five pound camera steady enough with your hands while pulling focus and possibly telling your cast how they are to act, (Personally, the whole directing cast and being a DP at the same time is total BS, it's to hard to do. So if you can, go out and get a DP, even if you can't pay him. Being a DP is a big deal and many up and coming individuals would probably take the job just for the experience if they can get behind the script, but this is another post for another time.) this makes shooting almost impossible to get the shots you really want to be pursuing, especially if you want to be able to move around on the fly or if you are in a sports situation.

Now, I know that there are some that might read this and say, well there are stabillizers out there that are designed for DSLRs like the Redrock and Zacuto, to which I will respond yes, there are and having used both of these, they are very nice, and are both also very expensive. Going for 2,000 and 3,500 US dollars resprectively. Even if you go with some of the cheapest options like the Jag system you are still looking at at least 500 dollars to get a good shoulder mount stabilizer.

There is another option which is to build your own equipment and to be honest, I've built most of my own equipment that I could, it often saves money, but you replace that with cost.

As I've been working on films I came across this little piece of equipment that I think every DSLR videographer needs and it's made by a company out of Texas called Cowboy Studio. It works really well on shoots where being able to move quickly almost a necessity, especially since you can get the item for under 30 dollars.

I've included some raw footage that I shot yesterday at the monster 5k dash of me using the stabilizer to see how smooth the footage can be. I've also included a link below for you to check out this stabilizer on Amazon or you can click here