Making a DIY Motion controlled slider

Motion Control in filmmaking

Did you know that motion control is a must for making special effects? I can tell you that almost every movie with special effects has at least one shot where they used motion control in a certain way. This can be something really simple liking cloning your actor or a shot that is full of 3D assets with such a difficult motion that a normal cameraman can't do it.

Because you can create camera movements with such precision and repeat them endlessly, the possibilities for motion control are endless. A dream of mine is to work with a huge robot arm or even to have one here at the Cinecom studio. We could create such awesome VFX.

Motorized Slider

But what if you don't have the budget for such an expensive Robot arm? The next best thing is a motion controlled slider. With this you can control the left to right movement, which already gives a lot of options. But it doesn't stop there, add a motion controlled filmmaking head to you slider and now you can also control to pan and tilt movement of your camera.

And of course you can always try to create your own motorized slider just like we did. But personally I wouldn't recommend it when you are considering to use it professionally. It was fun to make but so hard to get a steady and repetitive motion.

Storyblocks Video

Big thanks to Storyblocks video for their support. Luckily we don't have to make everything ourselves. Don't reinvent the wheel; save time and money with beautiful 4K stock clips, After Effects templates, Premiere Pro presets, overlay effects and so much more. Download unlimited video assets for a single price per year.