[russap5]

After the thread was started for posting everyone's videos, I decided to buy an HD camcorder. I haven't used it a whole lot and was planning to make an in-car mount for it. Then I found the CruiseCam and decided it was worth it and bought one.. after I ordered it online I find out these things have been on backorder since April. I made some calls, and even after offering me 10% discount to keep waiting, I just cancelled my order and made a trip to Lowe's.

I have seen various styles around the web for these mounts so I went into the hardware store with an open mind. I browsed around and had a few different ways of making it in my head. When the time came to choose a method, I decided I would try the cheapest and easiest one. I came up with a mount that only costs $6 and only requires drilling 5 holes through some plastic. Took me about 10 minutes to make.

(I also decided to add rubber pads on both ends for safety reasons, so call the "safe edition" the $9 mount.. :M5thumbs

Essentially this is a 3/4" PVC conduit pipe with two U-bolts with wingnuts, and a 1/4"-20 bolt for the camera mount.
- Other DIY mounts have used metal pipe. I find that excessive. The PVC is plenty sturdy and much lighter.
- Since its plastic I also think it would be safer in a crash and makes the drilling easy enough for a beginner.
- I wrapped the U-bolts with electrical tape to avoid metal-on-metal contact on the headrest posts and add grip

*Only issue currently is that I forgot to take in account the slant in the headrest posts, so the camera mount is angled up (see pictures). I am going to add a ball-joint camera swivel mount anyway so that is not a problem. But if you are going to make this and plan to mount it directly, make sure to angle the hole for your camera mount bolt*

And the good stuff:

 

[TMcNasty]

Ghetto fabulous! Love it.

 

[russap5]

Ghetto fabulous! Love it.

Ha thanks. Next step might be giving it a paint job. Something stealth. Maybe matte black..

 

[mmzcee]

Looks great. I've resorted to just duct taping my camera phone onto the dash before. now that's ghetto.

 

[Stone///M5]

Nice! Gotta give you points for creativity. :thumbsup: The matte black will dress it up a little.

 

[E55AMG2]

How is it with regard to vibration?

 

[russap5]

How is it with regard to vibration?

It feels plenty rigid. At least as much so as CruiseCam would be. I will take it for a ride tomorrow and see how it does.

 

[E55AMG2]

It feels plenty rigid. At least as much so as CruiseCam would be. I will take it for a ride tomorrow and see how it does.

Will it shake the camera to death, that's what Im asking

 

[cnes]

awaiting some footage

 

[blackxs]

awaiting some footage

+1 cool set up but where is the video?

 

[russap5]

OK OK! Here is the footage from today. My first opinion was that it was shaky.. but after looking at other in-car setup footage it looks about the same. I may experiment with a metal rod and even a mount that is higher up closer to the roof.

Both available in HD if you click on the video and open on YouTube

This one is without any lenses

This one uses a fisheye lens

 

[mmzcee]

This has potential..

 

[russap5]

To increase stability I have added a mount closer to the headrest instead of near the end of the pipe. I also have lowered the headrest so that it puts a little pressure on it to stabilize as well. Unfortunately I think a lot of the vibration is from the seat. I have enough pipe left to make one that attaches to both headrest so when I have free time I may make that one and see if it has any less vibration in the footage.

 

[razahyde]

it will probably work better if you mount it to the driver seat instead of the passenger seat. try that and report back.

btw, kings of leon ftw, whats the song in the second video lol

 

[russap5]

it will probably work better if you mount it to the driver seat instead of the passenger seat. try that and report back.

btw, kings of leon ftw, whats the song in the second video lol

Ill try the other headrest tomorrow. 2nd song is Banquet by Bloc Party

 

[cnes]

hmm, yeah it was pretty shaky, but you built it for 6 bucks, so thats pretty good. A while back I did a music video and most of it was filmed from inside a car, looking over the driver's shoulder and out the front windshield, I basically used a heavy tripod ontop of some sand bags, and some bungee cords to hold it in place, and the camera was a big one, so it made it more stable the whole back seat was use, but it was rock solid. it came out very smooth. I was filming with a very old volvo.

But I don't think you are looking into getting all that just for fun video recording your drives. What I can recommend, is maybe trying to fill the rod with sand or some material to absorb the car movement. Maybe even looking to get a gimbal to wear you screw in the camera so, the movement of the rod will not effect the camera.

good luck.

 

[E55AMG2]

What suspension are you running?

 

[Frye]

I was just messing around a couple weeks ago and raised the headrest on the passenger chair, wrapped the camera in a towel, and lowered the headrest back down until the camera was held in place. I need to adjust the chair to get a better view but it worked pretty well for free and was definitely held in place.

Edit: razahyde it's Bloc Party

 

[russap5]

What suspension are you running?

Stock suspension

I was just messing around a couple weeks ago and raised the headrest on the passenger chair, wrapped the camera in a towel, and lowered the headrest back down until the camera was held in place. I need to adjust the chair to get a better view but it worked pretty well for free and was definitely held in place.

That's an interesting idea. I may do that today too to compare. Do you think it would stay in place on a track? I don't want to crush my new camcorder..

 

[ECB]

First video ended right before you would have been at my office.