Comments on: STEADICAM MERLIN: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

By: Paul Milngavie

Paul Milngavie — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 14:16:00 +0000

Thanks for your honest appraisal. I just got a Merlin Steadicam (version 1) and had I read this first I would not have bought it. However, after a couple of days I am getting promising results with it and my Canon 5DII. It does boat and yaw a bit, but less than when I began. If I get it right I will be delighted. Already it is a pleasure to see the smooth gliding effect when walking, instead of tortuous bouncing up and down. One valid criticism you made is the very un-positive mounting of the dove plate to the camera body. One very small screw has the job of keeping the dove plate attached to the bottom of the DSLR. Upon this tenuous connection rests the success or failure of the whole rig. The area of contact between the dove plate and camera body is very small. But an even greater defect is that the positioning pin, which is supposed to prevent the camera from pivoting, is USELESS as there is no hole on the bottom of the Canon 5D to receive it. This a a huge problem as the whole rig unbalances when the camera inevitably starts pivoting around in use. So i did a quick fix with a little strip of very thin anti-slip rubber from a hardware store, which I place in between camera and the dove plate. It does stop the pivoting pretty much. Crude but works! I cannot understand why such an obvious problem and obvious solution were not foreseen by the designers. Once that major problem was solved it was fairly simple to get the rig working. Forget the famous recipes in the famous cook book. None of them came close to working! So I simply slapped it all together, slid the camera around until it balanced fairly well over the gimbal, opened and closed the spars a few of times, added and removed weights, and when it was reasonably close to balanced I fine-tuned with the spinning adjusters underneath. In a fairly short time it was giving acceptable results. Not perfect. I hope practice will improve the results. Why I chose this over the more popular glidecam or steadicam pilot etc is because it is much smaller and better for travel. To be sure, holding it for more than a few minutes is very tiring. I now see why folks use the vest and arm. But they are not practical for travel.

By: ELLIOT STERN

ELLIOT STERN — Fri, 31 May 2013 15:23:00 +0000

Now that the Merlin 2 is out and seems to address some of the issues you wrote about has your opinion in anyway changed?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 02 May 2013 06:36:00 +0000

I had the glidecam fot long periodo, and every time I was changing the camera from monopod to it, I had to rebalance again. The bottom part of the glidecam, can easily rotate, and you are off balance again. Now I have a merlin, and my impression is that one balance, it stay more balanced than the Glidecam, for who like me , continuously switch the camera. It is also more fast to adjust, because the trimmer are very precise respect the knob of the glidecam.

By: Bill Voelker

Bill Voelker — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 08:35:00 +0000

I have a Merlin and boating is driving me crazy! Thank you for explaining why and how of Merlin and its faults. I thought I was just a poor Merlin operator. I am in the process of ordering a Glidecam.

By: Ninamit

Ninamit — Mon, 14 May 2012 16:07:00 +0000

I tried to find the app but it seems to be unavailable.

By: Fabio Bersani

Fabio Bersani — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 08:28:00 +0000

Hi there,
I’ve pubblished a simple App for IOs devices for those needs all the Steadicam Merlin settings always in his pocket.
It’s called “Pocket Merlin” and it’s usefull for quick search your Merlin settings for your camera.
It’s only 0.99 $!!!

Feedback will be appreciated!!

Thanks

Fabio

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 03:41:00 +0000

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By: kevin

kevin — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 16:49:00 +0000

thanks for this write up – bought the merlin a couple of days ago – nothing but a nightmare – I understand these things have a learning curve – I thought let me buy the best – using it with a pnny gh2 and voighlander – of well – heading up shortly to trade in for the glidecam 2000

By: matthew20

matthew20 — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 13:39:00 +0000

Nice write up. I just bought a Merlin and am having a huge problem with the spars moving at the joint. I was able to minimize it by removing the knobs and dropping in a washer. Then when I retightened the knobs, i used channel locks to put the stank on them. There is a lot less flex now but it still happens. Poor design

By: El Skid

El Skid — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 20:51:26 +0000

Actually, it doesn’t. The hook prevents it from snapping sideways, but it still moves up and downa fair bit, and this only gets worse over time. Definitely a problem with DSLRs.