The Frédofocus

[Charles King]

Who is the operator in that shot?

[Fredo Beaugendre]

The 2 guys in this picture are both great professionals... and my very good friends, I mean people I see oftenly or even go for holidays with, outside of work: photo director is Jonny Semeco, Venezuelian (in the picture, playing with our 2nd Preston) living in France  for 12 years and Didier Frémont that used to be steadicamer (now working essentialy as "traditional" cameraman but still doing the steadicam shots as on this film, 2/3rd steadicam for camera 1 with myself) and well known here in France because he trained a lot of french steadicamers.

Some more shots of this beautifull adventure in Morocco:

[Fredo Beaugendre]

Sorry about the servomotor construction's topic... I'm real late ! In fact, I cannot find the RC servomotor I intended to use, it's not anymore available 
 So, I go on looking for the good one, probably issued from robotics and so I have to search on japonese sites...

 At the same time, with three friends, we opened a rental society in Morocco. This is a rental society that will be able, with a local production and gripment society and in contact with big french ones, to provide anything needed to shoot a film in Morocco: light, gripment, cameras, accessories (including some of my "home built") and steadicams (probably some second handed ones). One of the big work we'll have to do is training local technicians to become real "steadicam operators". It's name is "Tourner au Maroc" (Shoot in Morocco) and here is a first version of the internet site : http://tourneraumaroc.com/ sorry, it's only in french for the moment but it should be translated later in Arabic, Spanish and even in English.

[Vladimir Korshunov]

Hi Fredo! Morocco project! What a great venture! Good luck!
Japanese motors are very good. I also haunting out powerful, compact and silent engines for my future FF.
There are some powerful RCC servos under 70 USD but noisy...

[Fredo Beaugendre]

Hi Vladimir, in fact my problem with these Japonese, and not worlwide distributed, robot servos is the gestion of the program... I know nothing about C++ programming  so I look for the interface between PWM RC and serial.
About Morocco, they seem to have some work other there, but essentially middle or low budget, that's why we're thinking about bringing a steadicam and train a few local operators, hoping they would get quite good within a year, to propose this "usual" stabiliser at a possible price for a local film. Before this step, we will propose some lightning and accessories plus some camera rent, camera rental will be with a french society to have all kind of possibilities.
The society was founded 6 days ago and we already have two projects 
So, I must go on working on my frédofofocus evolution and the development of the site to propose it a bit much more professional and multilingual, don't hesitate telling me your impressions when it will improve, I hope it will be correct next week.
Best regards, frédo

[Vladimir Korshunov]

Fredo, thanks a lot for such a detail post!
The motor controller electronics is my problem too.  The only thing i did on this way is i assembled existing parts from Remote Controlled Cars>
http://vimeo.com/5880973
 Next step is to try to build wireless...
   Two projects the first week!    Great, congratulations!
Looking forward to see fredofocus in the new higher state.
  Vladi

[Fredo Beaugendre]

Hi Vladi, in fact I would say, about these RC based remote focus systems, wireless is easier than cable ones ! Just look back at the first version of the frédofocus. Harder thing is finding the right servo...

Just a picture of the signing for "Tourner au Maroc" last week:

[Vladimir Korshunov]

Fredo, thank You very much indeed for encouraging! Ill read your posts attentively.

Lovely picture, BTW.

[Fredo Beaugendre]

Nothing new about servomotors...
 But here are some news about Tourner au Maroc and a first version of the English speaking website: http://en.tourneraumaroc.com/ don't hesitate, my english is not so rich, to tell me about errors and mistakes, by advance, thanks for the help, frédo.