Sony FX870

[Martin Amada]

Guys,

I was poking around the dvinfo forum and saw a thread about the latest DVD players, and how some are using them for external monitors. I did that too several years ago, and it wasn't a great solution, but things have changed for the better.

I'd been thinking about spending big bucks (for me anyway) for a Nebtec, then I read what these folks had written about the latest Sony portable DVD player, which folds flat and has a battery incorporated with a 6 hour life. Fortunately they had one at the local shop that I was able to hook up to my camera.

I was looking for something primarily to get critical focus with my cine-adaptor, now that I have some good lenses for it. The $80 12 volt portable TV/display I bought last year was not cutting it, by a long shot. With 800 x 480 resolution no one is claiming the Sony display is HD, and of course it's lacking many features found in professional monitors, but the picture is very sharp with decent color and contrast - good enough for my purposes. The image is a little grainy, but overall much better than any portable DVD player I had seen before. Screen size is 8 inches diagonally.

I'll leave it those with more steadicam experience to say what they think about is daylight visibility, and whether they think it might be an option for use with stablizers. One thing in its favor is, you could use the 12 volt DC jack to power it from the sled until the bat goes down, and you've still got six hours of back-up built right in.

Here's a pic of the mount I made for it, which screws onto a standard 1/4" threaded stud. The uprights are aluminum and the cross bar is stainless. All I need now is to make a sun hood.

The slots in the uprights allow access to the video jack, the DC input and the on/off switch, whether the monitor is inserted right side up or upside down. It just slides in and out. Even when inverted, (the way (I'll be using it a lot) if you just covered the little SONY logo no one would know!

I had to make a custom cable to connect it to the mini-jack output of my Z1U, but that was pretty easy.

Here's a link to the thread that convinced me:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/sdtv-hdtv-video-monitors/121801-finally-external-lcd-monitor-solution-200-a.html

What I like is, it was only $200 and if I ever replace it with a "real" monitor I can still use it for its intended purpose.

And "It's a SONY."

Martin

[Martin Amada]

Here's some pics of the hood we made from 3/16" (5mm) acrylic. In the second pic you can see a couple of machine screws threaded through holes in the back so we can slip on a super lightweight extension of sorts with side flaps, shown in the mock-up at bottom.

Martin