External Monitors

[Wiseguy Productions]

hi Guys & Girls

I'm hell bent on making a camera jib - BUT there is no sense in that if you cant have an external monitor to see what you are shooting.

so we have to fix this problem first...

has anyone come across any ideas how to hook up an external monitor to a "consumer camera"?

eg my handy cam does not have outputs for external monitor -- has anyone hacked one?

the RED camera is looking better and better all the time! $$$ka-CHing$$$!

best, Phil

[TiE_Shepherd]

What kind of output does your camera have?

[feralucce]

if you have a consumer camera, then you most likely have access to yello video or component video (the hvxx series has comonent video out.)

We went to radio shack, purchased a pack of RCA male and a pack of RCA female, and a length of Cat 5 ethernet cable. since the component cables are composed of a feed and a return on the Y, Pb, and Pr channels, you can use the twisted pairs of the ethernet cable to achieve the same thing. Connect the solid of the pair to the center post and the dotted to the outter post.

If you have an older camcorder with just yellow video, speaker wire will work for this purpose.

Using this method, you can easily and heaply make a video cable for any use of any length. Now any television that has the appropriate connection can be used as your monitor.

[Wiseguy Productions]

hi

yes - its Sony DCR HC52

it has AV/R outputs (audio video record) and yes, come to think of it, Ive seen the coupler used to join that cable to a portable dv player - its on this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIqyv2lLUp0) at exactly 7:00 minutes in.

I think I can get that far. now the only problem is running the portable dvd players.

that issue I asked about in another post but anyway, they require 9.5v (which seems like an odd voltage to me) so I bought a converter specifically fro them with a 9.5v setting but that did now work.

they work when they are plugged into the cigarette lighter in the car - but apparently dont like the converter I got.

I wonder is there was a battery pack equivalent to a cigarette lighter?

worst case, I guess theres always used playstations around like they used in that video - they run on batteries.

also need some help with external mic set up (http://forum.indymogul.com/showthread.php?t=21241).

thanks for your help

best, Phil

[feralucce]

If you are up to the wiring challenge, you can build a simple wiring rig that will allow you to hook it straight into a deep cycle marine battery.

[Wiseguy Productions]

Kriss

you mean a 12v battery like in your car?

this guy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjwMcfs27Zk) built a battery pack to run his camcorder -- although I don't get it... his camera is 8.4v but he uses 2x9v batteries.

wonder if there is some sort of battery combination like that that will run the DC monitors?

[Wiseguy Productions]

Hello all you fans out there in TV Land.

just an update to let you know how this build is coming.

first, I was able to get the external monitor to work with my camera using an adaptor gizmo go between which converted RCA plugs to the jack type plugs common with electronics.

so I got the picture from the camcorder to the monitor. ta! da!

Its Alive! as Dr Frankenstein would say.

this means we can put the camera at the end of the boom and still see whats going on.

BUT, power to the monitor was just from the car cigarette lighter. in other words, this jib crane would have to be close to the car.

the other option I cams across is some power packs that you can buy in the auto section or outdoor section of department stores.

the cheapest Ive seen it like 150.00. I dont know how long these will keep the monitor running for.

a small 12 v motorcycle battery would be cheaper and neater but again, dont know how long it will run for.

the monitors claim that they use less than 25w of power.

some dept stores are also starting to offer alternative energy stuff like small windmills and solar panels to help keep batteries and power packs charged.

the jib shot would only be one of many. I was hoping the bike battery would be sufficient for a few shots.

generators are getting real cheep too. there were ones for 180.00! but then you have the gas and noise problem.

re external mic: I tried to farm the job out to several shops to hack into the audio board inside the camera, but no one is willing to do that.

Also tried begging with the store to take it back so I could change it for a camera with external mic capability but no luck.

I do want to buy a pro camera but I think we are on the verge of everything going to solid state - no more tapes, no more disks in computers, no more cooling etc.

My friend just finished shooting a feature film on the RED camera - all solid state.

what he found was that it creates beautiful pictures but the files are also huge!

you need huge storage, computing power and lots of camera experience to make it all worth while.

steady cam: meantime I was able to rig up a steady cam camera mount pretty simply. I would suspect that this will be getting more use than the jib anyway. totally mobile and par for most shots.

best, Phil

[bobaandy1]

Just get a small TV and plug it in. That's the closest equivalent to what the pros do, which is using a broadcast monitor with a very high resoultion.

[Flamekebab]

Just get a small TV and plug it in. That's the closest equivalent to what the pros do, which is using a broadcast monitor with a very high resoultion.How would that solve his power supply issue?

I'm wondering what the best solution is to the same issue myself. I don't want to have to run things from a cigarette lighter socket, all our gear is carried on our backs around the city and I don't have ready access to a car.

If anyone has any good suggestions as to how to provide the power I'd be interested to hear.

[lambar]

Solar Power. A small panel runs around 25 to 50 US dollars and can deliver 100Watts

[Flamekebab]

How much sunlight would such a device require? I'm in Scotland, I can't say we get a lot of sun!

Would it be possible to put together some battery powered solution that would deliver the required juice?

[lambar]

I copied this quote from a webpage "The relatively high latitude of Scotland means that although winter days are very short, long summer days have an extended twilight. On the longest day there is no complete darkness in the north of Scotland. Lerwick, in Shetland, has about four hours more daylight (including twilight) at midsummer than London."

It is pretty easy to hook up solar panels to batteries, just google around. If you need to run AC items (like tv's, lights), you will need to add an invertor to convert from DC to AC. Here is a good webpage on how to make a solar power generator.
http://www.rain.org/~philfear/how2solar.html

[Flamekebab]

During the Winter here in Edinburgh it can get dark as early as 1530 - 1600. We do a lot of our filming after then so solar panels aren't necessarily a good choice, hence why I'm wondering about simply using batteries as a power source.

Unfortunately my electronics expertise isn't exactly phenomenal and as such I have no idea of working out practical methods for powering devices.