You may know that Steadicams and Glidecams can help you get smooth shots, but do you know how they do it? For starters, you should know that these brand names are types of flying camera stabilizers. Flying camera stabilizers are not hovercrafts — they’re a type of equipment that can help you achieve shake-free moving shots in places where a dolly isn’t practical. Let's dig in a bit and explore where these useful devices came from and how they’re used.

The first flying camera stabilizer of its kind, the Steadicam, was introduced in 1976 by Academy Award-winning inventor and cameraman Garrett Brown. It’s the thing that allowed audiences to run alongside Rocky Balboa in the streets of Philadelphia, glide six inches off the ground behind a tricycle in The Shining, and fly through speeder bike chase scenes in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. Even more ambitiously, Alexander Sokurov orchestrated a single 96-minute Steadicam shot in his film Russian Ark. In short, flying camera stabilizers have become one of the most dynamic production tools in the film industry.

It’s easy to imagine the types of cool shots you can achieve with a flying camera stabilizer, but describing the mechanics behind it is trickier. So let's start off with some visuals:

A three-part stabilizer made up of vest, arm, and sled. Photo courtesy of Shutterstock

This setup isolates the camera from your body while still enabling you to control it. The vest picks up your movements and directs them along the arm to the sled, where the camera is mounted and counterbalanced.

The key to smoothness and control is finding the camera's center of gravity, the point where its weight is perfectly balanced. The closer you come to holding the camera by this point, the more stable it will be and the more control you’ll have. Unfortunately, a camera’s center of gravity is inside the camera itself! The solution is to mount the camera to a counterbalance that will spread out the weight and migrate the center of gravity. You can do this by mounting the counterbalance on top of a sled pole via a sleigh.

Now, we can grip the sled pole near the new center of gravity and move it around without tipping the camera. The camera doesn’t tip because the pull of gravity on the sled pole is equal in all directions. To maintain the equilibrium we just created, we attach the handle using a specialized joint called a gimbal. The gimbal allows the sled to pivot freely along three axes, which helps separate the movement of the cameraman from the camera. This way, the camera can remain steady and balanced even if its operator is jostling the handle.

If this is all a bit confusing, check out this video by Chris Bauer, in which he takes you through a basic Steadicam flyer setup:

Three decades after Garrett Brown’s Steadicam design, there are tons of flying camera stabilizers available, priced from $200 for small sled-only stabilizers to over $10,000 for professional rigs that include lots of accessories. Luckily, DIY filmmakers have built flying stabilizer rigs on the cheap! Here’s an affordable setup by StudioAmarelo pieced together using off-the-shelf items and assembled with a screwdriver and multi-tool:

Also, check out this nifty DIY Steadicam setup by D. Eric Franks:

Getting your flying stabilizer balanced can take practice, and remember that each time you add or subtract equipment, e.g., change a lens or a battery, you need to re-balance it. But with some trial and error and good old-fashioned patience, you'll be flying about with your camera and capturing super-smooth footage in no time.