My Equipment
When the idea for this trip took root and wouldn’t let go, I decided I didn’t want to just drive Route 66, I wanted to capture the spirit of the open road, the beauty of America, and the heart of the heartland.
There’s a lot entailed with this! First and foremost, I needed to take pictures and video. I needed a website and a social media presence. I needed to put together content so that others could see what I see, experience what I experience and hopefully share and enjoy that vision.
To do that, I needed equipment. I had (and still have) an older Nikon and a professional-grade older aluminum tripod. Beyond that, I was sorely lacking and had much to learn. Hitting up friends and acquaintances yielded little in the way of advice, except from Ken Kleiderman (BIG shout out to you, Ken!) and Amanda Kiely. Fortunately there’s a lot of content on YouTube and I went to work figuring out what I needed to learn, and then learning just enough to be dangerous.
That led to equipment. Thanks to winning a contest at work with a $1,000 gift certificate to Amazon and a favorable tax return, it was time to go shopping. Looking for equipment, reading product reviews, shopping for great buys as after all, there is a budget! Here’s what I acquired, in approximate order:
- Mount Dog light boxes with adjustable bulbs (three temperatures & three brightness settings)
- Levalier mic set (small wireless mics that clip on your shirt)
- Rode microphone for Nikon (and later, the video camera)
- Video tripod
- DJI Memo gimbal for phone
- DJI Ronin gimbal for Nikon
With this setup, I started creating content for my trip. I did initial vlogs using my Surface Pro and Snowball Blue microphone, and the content came out pretty decently. I started filming car repairs using the Nikon with Rode mic and the DJI Memo gimbal with my iPhone 8.
As I got closer to the trip and got the car fixed (an entire ordeal in itself!), it was time to get more equipment.
- GoPro Hero10 Black Creator Edition (includes handheld/stand, media box, light
- GoPro accessories (suction cup, accessories kit & case, battery charger with 3 batteries)
- Case for GoPro (since the case I bought with the accessories didn’t have any room for the GoPro Creator Edition I needed another case!)
- Dead cat for Rode mic
- 2nd charger and two more batteries for the Nikon
- Panasonic HC-X2000 video camera
- Telephoto and wide-angle lenses for the HC-X2000
- Filters for the HC-X2000
- LED light camera mounted
- USB charger, since most of the equipment requires USB charging
- Samsung S22+ mobile phone
The Editing Room
That wasn’t all – to crunch and edit all this content, I needed computer power. My nice i5 desktop with 8GB RAM was great for what I do normally but couldn’t keep up with the video editing, so I picked up a used i7 desktop with 16GB RAM and a better graphics card. And for good measure an LG 34″ curved monitor. (This is really nice to work on!)
I checked into free video editing software and two came up as contenders: DaVinci Resolve and Hitfilm (formerly Hitfilm Express). Resolve wouldn’t work on the i5, and kept puking on the i7. Hitfilm Express ran just fine on the i5, except video taken on my Surface Pro (while sitting at the table) required Handbrake to convert. And then creating opening graphics using PowerPoint, of all things, and editing images with Photoshop Elements.
Next was a new laptop with enough horsepower to edit content on the road, a refurbished Dell XPS 15 9520 with 32GB RAM and a 512GB HDD. That was really sweet, except the HDD puked two days ago and I’m sending it back to Dell. Hopefully the repaired machine arrives in time for the trip, or it’s a fast trip to BestBuy!
It’s two weeks before the journey and I’m practicing with the equipment, taking in-car video to determine best settings, practicing car drive-by video, testing audio and figuring out the best way to get decent content on a budget.
I’m still a novice with Hitfilm. I’m able to make videos to show how I repaired certain elements on the car, that are good enough to show others how to do the same. I can spice them up with music, make the intros and exits a touch above boring, transition between sequences. There’s still a lot to learn, but I’m on my way.