Make your footage smooth as butter with this simple syringe slider

As you can tell by our name, we love DIY projects. And while we enjoy building some more complex stuff, we’re also blown away by simple, yet effective solutions. If they’re also unusual and cheap – it doesn’t get any better!

Well, this DIY slider has it all. It uses a syringe and a wooden frame to make your footage nice and smooth without investing almost anything.

Btoretsukuru shared this slider on X, demonstrating its smooth and controlled sliding experience for a smartphone. It’s pretty easy to understand how it works: you need a wooden frame that allows your phone to slide horizontally, encountering resistance from a syringe plunger. You can adjust the plunger’s resistance by attaching different diameter tips, so you can even customize your DIY slider a bit.

「注射器スライダー」を使った滑らか撮影テクが進化しました！！
枠を作って注射器とスマホを収め、いろんなアングルでスライド動作できるようにしました！
動画10秒目からの作例もぜひ見てください！#鉄道模型 #Nゲージ #Bトレ #ジオラマ pic.twitter.com/57uVTeHOxq

— B作 (@Btoretsukuru) September 24, 2024

The user even shared a sample video to demonstrate the power of this simple little slider, and I think it’s pretty dope! Of course, it’s not suitable for all scenarios, but shooting small objects like the train set in the example is perfect. You could also find it handy for shooting product or food videos.

This reminded me of the famous “towel slider” many filmmakers have tried out. Sometimes, the best solutions are, indeed, the simplest ones.

[via Hack A Day]

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