It seems like every week I read about a new piece of camera gear that makes things easier to film. Oftentimes, the new equipment is expensive, and within a few months it is copied by many companies until it gets incredibly cheap. Take the Movi Camera Stabilizer that came out in 2013 for example. New, it was $15,000 and offered unparalleled electronic stabilization and smoothness in an incredibly light body. Now two years later, there are at least 10 different camera stabilizers on the market that function similarly to the Movi for a fraction of the cost. Even with all the different options for stabilization available, I still use a Glidecam HD-4000 for most of my work. Why? Because I mostly film weddings, and my ideal piece of gear is something that is easy to setup, tear down, and transport. I have yet to hear that said about the Movi or any of these other electronic stabilizers. If I can’t get equipment unloaded and running in 5 minutes, then I will probably miss something during the wedding day.
Recently, Konova sent me a piece of equipment that I believe will fit perfectly into my current wedding workflow. It’s called the Master Pan, and it integrates with Konova’s entire line of camera sliders. If you’ve looked at my previous Konova videos, you may have seen my review of their Radial Dolly; a cool piece of equipment that lets you rotate smoothly around a small object, or an entire room. It works perfectly for filming a wedding ring on a table, or rotating around an entire dance floor as people do the Wobble. The Radial Dolly comes with a big caveat that affects all tabletop dollys, and that is that is must have a completely smooth surface. Your best bet for using it is on a smooth table or dance floor, otherwise the footage looks shaky and rough.
The new Master Pan is Konova’s solution to the shortcomings of all tabletop dollys. It attaches to any Konova Slider and allows for precise, easily replicated, and smooth panning while sliding. Unlike a tabletop dolly, I’m hoping that I can just put my slider on the ground without worrying about the terrain, and get awesome ring shots and other cool shots that require the tripod head to rotate while sliding.
The Problem It’s Trying To Solve
Picture the shot everybody wants: a ring sitting on something, and the camera swinging around it so you see it from changing angles with real parallax. With a tabletop dolly you set it down, hope the surface is level, hope it’s completely flat, and then rotate. And whenever you’re shooting a wedding you do not have a ton of time to stand there hoping about anything.
The Master Pan does the same move from a slider instead, which means the terrain under it stops mattering.
What Came In The Box
Konova sent me two sizes, because I have both an 80cm and a 150cm Konova slider, which is why the box that showed up is about four feet long.
Padding on both sides, which I appreciate more than you’d think, because I am a huge fan of good padding. Then the guide bars themselves, one for each slider length, and the 150 is substantially longer than the 80. Which is just basic math, so you probably already worked that out.
The full contents: one instruction manual with a setup guide, the panning mount, two end mounts, the guide bars, a wrench, and a little pack of cotton swabs.
The Panning Mount
This is the part that does the actual work. It sits on top of the slider, your camera mounts to it, and as the carriage travels the head rotates. And it is smooth. You can push it with one finger and it turns slowly and evenly the whole way, which tells you there are some genuinely nice bearings in there.
Mine is marked KMP80, so that one is presumably matched to the 80cm slider, though I’m not an expert on this stuff yet.
The End Mounts Are The Clever Bit
There’s one for each end of the slider, and they screw in. What makes them interesting is that they have measuring points marked on them and adjustable angles, so you can dial in exactly how much rotation you want across the length of the move, lock it down, and get the same result again.
That repeatability is the whole reason I care about this thing. Anybody can get a nice rotating move once. Getting the same move twice, on a real timeline, with a couple standing there waiting on you, is a completely different problem.
Inward And Outward Panning
The manual lays out three setups, and it’s mostly pictures, which I love.
The basic setup is a normal slider move. Inward panning keeps the camera aimed at a subject while the carriage travels, which is the parallax tracking shot and the reason you’d buy this. Outward panning turns the camera away as it travels, which gives you a panoramic sweep.
The other thing worth knowing is that this fits the entire K series, so my 80 and my 150 both work with it. If you already own a Konova K series slider you are basically guaranteed this bolts on, and that kind of interoperability is wonderful.
The Full Review
I have a few weddings to film in the coming weeks and I will be testing the Master Pan extensively. Expect my full review soon!
And I did make it. Here is the Konova Master Pan setup and review video, with it actually assembled and shooting instead of sitting in pieces on my dining room table.
If you have any questions, please leave me a comment or get in touch through my website.
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