Camera Dolly

Along with a colleague that I worked with last year for my AS Production, I designed and built a portable camera dolly for complex tracking and moving shots. Using the schools facilities and a small budget subsidised by ourselves, we created a very useful implement that when used correctly produces really nice, professional looking shots.

What we found, however, was that without weighing down the board of the dolly, the movement was shakey. Our progression in learning about this process can be seen by the steadiness of the final shot. We decided to borrow weights from the Science department which worked perfectly.


Assembly

The main components of the dolly were as follows:

• 3m PVC Pipe x2
• Wooden Board
• 8 identical bearing wheels
• 4 steel angle plates
• Miscellaneous 1/4" nuts and bolts

A creation such as this required a small amount of equipment and as my Uncle - who helped me with the crane - was unavailable for this project, we utilised the available facilities in school. These included:

• Pillar Drill
• Alan Key
• Pliers

The most important component was acquiring the identical wheels. Upon researching these wheels, we found that individually they were quite pricey and bulk ordering didn't help much. We, therefore, decided the best route would be to purchase rollerblades and dissemble them. This being the most expensive aspect of the build costing us £14.99, though saving us in the long run. We mounted the resulting wheels to angle plates which could be suspended below the board to run on the PVC pipe.

The end result was a great, low budget dolly that, with the right execution, can create beautiful, professional shots.