The Q-Ball robotic camera system from Camera Corps has soared to new heights thanks to rock climber Chris Watford and his rigging team at ClimbSouth. Camera Corps’ remote cameras, tracking systems and camera support systems are installed into difficult and hard to reach locations by ClimbSouth. These include mountain passes, jungles, major cities and sports stadiums for host broadcast video and commercial productions.
“I have been fortunate enough to work on specialised video installations for over 14 years,” said Chris Watford, CEO of ClimbSouth. “Since the Q-Ball’s introduction, the ClimbSouth team has encountered installations that include flying Q-Ball cameras over public squares, neatly from historic buildings and stadium flying for sports events.”
ClimbSouth has a team of eight professionals who travel around the world, and with the introduction of Q-Ball, installation times have dropped considerably.
“Q-Ball has definitely cut the time for high-angle applications in half over flying more traditional POV cameras,” said Watford. “The systems are light so they can easily be carried up to the highest perch without causing stress on the climber.”
According to Watford, placing a camera system in high locations presents a number of challenges for the team because they need a place to set cables, power and interface boxes. This has always been an issue with larger camera systems in terms of how to mount the supplementary equipment so that it stays up safely.
Camera Corps’ Q-Ball offers a mini-cam system in a compact, weather-resistant HD/SD remotely controlled camera, and features a 10-times-zoom optical lens and pan/tilt motors. Housed in a 115mm diameter aluminium sphere, the Q-Ball camera has a two-megapixel CMOS sensor and can operate in daylight or with infrared illumination. It delivers 1080i/720p high definition or 625/525 standard definition imagery at 50- or 59.94-Hz refresh rates.
“Q-Ball cleans up the installation and we can get the job done quickly, which saves on production time,” concluded Watford. “The Q-Ball also provides a great, clean picture and has become the go-to camera for special and spectacular shots.”
www.cameracorps.co.uk
