I am always
at a complete loss when shooting DSLR video and needing to easily find the
focus, or zoom ring. I grab the wrong
one or miss it completely and end up with noise and movement in the final shot. What I needed was a follow focus ring that
attaches to the lens. These things make
it as quick and simple as possible to rotate that focus ring while shooting.
A little
internet research will provide a plethora of DIY solutions. The one I liked the best was an idea
presented by knoptop here. It uses
silicon jar openers. The only problem
was that the recommended vendor no longer carried these things. I am not a patient person so upon learning
that I couldn’t run out a grab a few, I went to work thinking of what I could
use that was laying around here.
Enter the
filter wrench (Adorama: small - big, B&H: small - big). I have a bunch of these
in different sizes. So I tried a
few. They work great! If you have followed at least my recent posts
you will know that two criteria must be met for new gear and accessories and
using existing filter wrenches perfectly met all the criteria – no added bulk
or weight and it didn’t cost me a thing.
I eventually
found the jar openers at Target and bought all they had left. In practice I use a variety of combinations
of both the jar opener and the filter wrench.
Sometimes I need a rubber band around the top of the filter wrench, but
that doesn’t affect its function at all.