In the midst of this mass gear update, I’ve found myself kinda living back in old times. I remember in the early years, many trips to Ace Hardware, particularly the one in Lakewood off Alameda and Union, where I’d go in and buy various pieces to jimmy-rig my chase setup. This included running to go and get a few screws, bolts, or nuts to finish various mounting rigs or whatever I was working on. One of my funnier stories back in 2007, somewhere, I had to go in literally got a 7-cent screw. I needed something for a mount I was customizing. I would end up getting audited the following year after claiming a loss on my taxes (before I finally ‘hit it big’); in the audit, I was asked specifically about some of the equipment write-offs, and I presented one of the receipts for that 7-cent screw. The auditor looked it, closed her notebook, and I was dismissed haha
Yesterday, I was back to my old ways; rolling into Ace a couple times yesterday for a couple parts to modify my old Filmtools Gripper camera rig. About 10 years ago (holy shit, I’m old), I modified the default rig with a quick release plate that matched my Dolica tripod system so I could move cameras between the mount and the tripods with ease. I’ve had that setup til now, but have always wanted to further modify it with a full tripod head as moving the camera required a two hand approach of releasing the gripper handle and then moving the camera to it’s preferred position. While a minor issue, it was enough to be a pain as it would require reaching over to the passenger side of the car which wasn’t always the most comfortable (don’t worry, I was stopped). But because the system wasn’t broken, I just never fixed it. The other issue was needing an extension of the gripper since adding a full ball head would add several inches of height and thus not fit the camera on the current setup. Well, when I started making all the swaps, including the new set of tripods, I finally decided to make the upgrade, getting a low profile ball head and finding the extension kit online. Yesterday, I attached the ball head to the gripper mount and it’s waiting on the extension rod that should arrive HOPEFULLY by Monday, because we may be on the road as early as Tuesday if forecasts come to fruition (another post).
All that said, I spent more than 7-cents at Ace Hardware yesterday, but not by much. The 3/8″ bolt was the ‘big spend’, but it worked and the rid looks great. Once the extension arrives, I’ll give it the test run and I SHOULD be able to mount it higher on the windshield, which actually will free up the viewing a bit as the current location for the mount was kinda middle on the windshield; not a HUGE blind spot, but any obstructions are not good, so mounting the suction cup higher (likely up behind the rear-view mirror) will definitely free up some eyeball space in the middle of the windshield. But alas, looking forward to finally being able to easily adjust the camera with one hand, and have it easily reachable from the driver seat (again, while stopped – I can’t believe I need to re-enforce that every time, but alas).
The irony of all this; last May I bought my Subaru Ascent, a much bigger ride than any previous ride I’ve had minus my mini-vans. But with the bigger INTERIOR space, I have DOWNSIZED all interior setup quite a bit, and I am eager to get all this done and working as we’re about to head into a busy stretch, it looks. Again, I’ll touch on all that over the weekend. Just wanted to yap a bit this morning before I got on with my day as it’s been fun kinda resetting my chase setup a bit. Kinda takes me back to the early years. 😀
