backmount vest

[cody carson]

i see this discussed earlier, but it did not quite answer my questions.  i would like to see a picture of the backmount in action, becaues i do not understand what it would look like, or how you could movie it around well if the arm wraps aronud your body?  also, cody talked about something molded belt?  can you buy some kind of belts that fit the shape of hips or something?

[Wade Francom]

I know these pictures are of a vest that is out of your range (most pf ours too, for that matter), but this is a good example of a back-mount vest.

On front-mount vests, the mount is of course on the front, and to one side. This puts all the weight of the rig on your hips, forward of your center of gravity. So, you constantly are applying force backward to counteract it. If you run one of these for an extended amount of time, it'll kill your back.

On back-mounted vests... don't let the title confuse you, because the arm-to-vest connection is still mounted forward and to the side, like the front mounted vest. However, rather than connecting to a plate on the front, the steadicam arm connects to an L-shaped arm that then extends around the torso to the back and connects to a solid framework (molded, ridgid) that wraps around the lower back and up the spine between the shoulder blades. I believe this is what you are referring to as the "molded belt". It'll cost an arm and a leg to have a molded belt made, but there are prototypes and plans in this forum for a back-mounted vest if you dig a little deeper.

The advantage that back-mounted vests have over front mount is that it drastically makes the operators job easier, by moving the downward forces generated by the rig from a non-solid spot (front mounted forces must be counteracted by stomach, mid-section muscles) to a solid spot (forces centered directly on or down the spine). This is much less strenuous on back and abdominal muscles.