How long would one want one’s cable to be?

Let’s assume for argument that attachment to trees and tensioning will be taken care of with slings and karabiners and such.

How long would one want one’s cable to be?

Depends on how far apart the tree’s are. 🙄

What he said, the length of the trail surely?

About 500 meters seams about right …

Heheh, I should’ve thought of that shouldn’t I!

I’m really not having a good day today.

I built one of these over the summer. I bought a full reel of climbing cord which was about 80 metres I think mainly cause I wanted to be able to carry the cord, cam and runner in my camelback mule.

One thing I’ve found is that there is a lot of wobble on the camera as it starts of slowly, my runner body is quite short so i think a longer runner would probably work better.

I was planning on climbing cord… Good to know about the runner, I shall bear that in mind. What did you make yours out of? I’m currently thinking some bent aluminium would do the job, but open to suggestions.

I made it with the alu strips with holes in to save weight, bent it in a machine, took some skateboard wheels to a lathe and put in a groove the same size as the cord. Stuck my go pro on, got shouted out by some walkers for laying booby traps 🙂

It depends on what weight you are going to be lifting on it really, if your lifting a camera person then you will need cable!Plus a $!th load of safety gear etc…….
For a small gopro setup a lot less, there are issues with physics distance and weight of cable over long runs you will need to take into account on big setups.

But in using metal cable be bloody careful when loading it as if it goes it will literally take peoples heads off (hence the physics calculations!)

Will, if you’re wanting a smooth film you ideally want 2 cables and a rig carrying the camera, someone I know has made such a thing, I’ll see if I can find his pictures tonight, but if youi search vimeo for singletraction you’ll find a couple of the vids, they come out very steady.

Cheery Johnny, that’d be ace – thinking more camelbak-able than big and heavy, but all suggestions are welcome.

The sharpness of aluminium was a bit of a concern, though we’d likely only be using it when it’s quiet… I’m now thinking about vac forming something at work, it’s not like a GoPro is over heavy

**edit** Badllama – the plan is for a teeny light GoPro setup, not an actual human based one! Possibly further down the line I may attempt to butcher some RC servos for speed up / slow down and maybe even panning, but for starters it’ll be simple and light, climbing accessory cord is the plan for the actual “cable”.

I always though a cheap light one would be two cables* (* insert your setup here) plus a RC car chassis with a pan and tilt mount hanging off it thus then allow you to alter the speed of the camera on the cables* to follow the riders. 🙂

Your going to have to be pretty close to your riders with a gopro BTW otherwise they will be dot in the frame 🙂

I did one with a 30m washing line. it gave me approximately 3 seconds of steady footage!

I still fancy one of these instead of cable: http://quadcopter.heliguy.com/article/A-Quadcopter-to-carry-a-GoPro-camera/

The copter drones look amazing, but out of my price range though! And the GoPro issue is definitely a consideration, but I also have a couple of other cameras I can use with a bit more zoom, so we should be ok. Well apart from the epic levels of mince displayed by the rider!

I’ve always thought a full RC chassis is a bit excessive, just one wheel should be enough to speed or slow it a little bit. It might also be enough to make it wobble all over the place though!

How about a buddy controlling the speed using a fishing wire / fishing reel. You do have a buddy right?

[video]http://vimeo.com/46718954[/video]

[video]http://vimeo.com/49417357[/video]