Hello,

I have been invited to take a flight on a small fixed wing propeller plane over Hong Kong's Victoria harbour. I was planning to take my Canon HF100 however am concerned that the vibrartions may make the footage unusable. Any users have any tips or experience on this and or ways to dampen/reduce the vibration effects? Is clamping the camcorder to the internal structure a good option?
I imagine I will be shooting wide angle most of the time??

Thanks for your quick reply, the flight is in a couple of days...


Tom

PS: I have posted this in the general section as I imagine it applies to all HD camcorder users, I just mention my model for reference to it's form factor etc.

Is clamping the camcorder to the internal structure a good option? No

I imagine I will be shooting wide angle most of the time? Yes

This is where electronic viewfinders tend to help. Hold your camera to your head and try and hold it steady. Most small aircraft just vibrate too much. When decending, you might get less vibration as the pilot reduces power to decend. I usually just shoot a lot of video and hope for the best. Don't forget to get outside shots of the plane before you board and after you get off. It's nice to show people what the plane looked like on the outside....




Rich

I'd be more concerned with how the plane's windows are going to screw with your autofocus

ok thx guys. i saw some footage from youtube, but actually seems quite difficult to get any smooth footage or interesting angles...

A scratched windscreen makes it almost impossible for auto-focus to work if zooming long distance.

I use a RAM aviation mount on the dash with a HG20. A newer C172 that is taken care of has very little vibration. A touch more than a car, going by feel.

Works fine. From little experience the image stabilization ON seems to work the best.

Low quality video here:http://www.vimeo.com/3496783(side to forward slip)
Have more & daytime, but not enough time.

P.S. if there is zero (0) wind you can hold the camera steady. Otherwise it's impossible.

Thanks Guy80,

I notice the RAM mounts are simply clamps and dont appear to have any particular vibration damping or suspension system? in any case I have a generic clamp so will try it any see how it goes as we are planning to go up on a C172.

Although this morning was seriously foggy, so tomorrow morning may be cancelled in any event!

Thanks,
Tom

The RAM aviation mount is essentially a C-clamp, though it does have 2 rubber ball joints.

Since your camera doesn't have an internal Hard Drive I think any form of Clamp should work in short order.

Enjoy the flight. Make sure you tell the pilot if anything discomforts you.

If you know that pilot and if it is his plane and IF it is a Cessna 172, you can pull the cotter pin on the passenger window and when you are airborn you can open the window and while holding the handle, grandually raise it to fully open. Wind force will keep it open and you can shoot out the window. I do this all the time for still photography. Just don't stick the camera out into the slip stream, or you may lose your lens hood, etc.