In this article I'm going over videography setups I made out of LEGOs...back in 2017. At the time it was a pretty decent option I had on-hand to accomplish what I needed with my video work. The main focus here is a video slide because I have a corresponding video I had made back then. However, at the end of the article I show photos of two different mounts I had made.
Check out the DIY slider video on YouTube:
Fujifilm X100F Digital Camera:
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| The LEGO slider with a camera mounted on the cart and positioned on the track between four clamp lights. |
A camera slider is a piece of equipment that allows a camera to make a smooth sliding motion, usually horizontally, to create dynamic and professional-looking video shots. By moving the camera smoothly along a track, filmmakers can add a sense of depth and movement to what would otherwise be a static scene.*
The Construction: Cart and Track
Let's take a closer look at the build. The camera rests on a small cart, which is a simple bowl construction with plastic wheels. The set did come with rubber tires that fit over the wheels, but they bounce around and stick to the rails. All of that is amplified in the video recording. With the hard plastic wheels themselves, it works well.
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| A close-up of the LEGO cart, showing the plastic wheels alone for smooth movement. |
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| The tires removed. |
The track, or slide, is also made from LEGOs. To keep it stable on the table, it's taped down with no-residue duct tape. This holds really well, and of course, the no-residue part is very nice so it doesn't stick to any surfaces.
Learn more about tape in my video about the 3M tape and Gaffer tape:
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| The LEGO track is held securely to the table with 3M no-residue tape. |
For this particular project, I was filming SD cards I was doing speed tests on. The cart is built so that two pieces help the camera angle downward for the shot.
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| The angled pieces are usually used as roof tiles. |
The Gear and The Slide in Action
The camera I'm using is the Fujifilm X100F. It's a lot smaller than the Nikon D600 and D610 DSLRs I also had at the time. It works a lot better for a lightweight delicate setup like this. I was able to get the blocks just right so it doesn't shift that much.
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| The Fujifilm X100F camera being used for this project. |
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| The camera fits well with the sizing and spacing of LEGO. |
As you would expect, it works, though there's a little bit of movement shift back and forward, but it's not terrible. You can easily slide it through the whole table's length.
Technique and Challenges
The big challenge is getting the movement perfect. When you look at the video, everything is amplified at the focal length that the X100F has and distance to the subject. So even little tiny shifts of the mount or the camera can be noticeable. It's challenging, but I think it works just well enough that I don't need to go out and buy an actual video slide.
To help with this, the X100F has a 60 frames a second recording option, which helps out with the final result. Then I can slow it down in post-processing to 30 frames a second.
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| A final shot from the camera's perspective. |
Use What You Have
That is pretty much it. Here are pictures of other LEGO mounts that I have set up in the past. Most of them have just dealt with viewfinders and trying to photograph inside viewfinders, which is pretty challenging.
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| A LEGO mount for recording through the DSLR's viewfinder with an action camera. |
This mount allowed me to get a view inside of DSLR viewfinders, so I could show what's happening with the various indication values, autofocus frames, and other features shown inside there. That was a cheap action camera but the wide focal length worked well enough to capture detail inside the viewfinder even though it is fixed focus and not designed for use close up.
The camera's lens: This focuses the incoming light from your subject onto the camera's sensor to take the photo. The viewfinder eyepiece: This is a separate viewing system that projects an image onto your eye. It must be focused correctly for your specific vision, just like a pair of glasses. * I think this is part of why the combination worked.
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| Another custom LEGO mount for viewfinders. |
In this case I used a smartphone to film inside of the X100F's hybrid optical and electronic viewfinder. The benefit here is that I could get the mount flat to the camera while keeping both devices exactly where they needed to be. Sure, you could try to use some sort of dedicated phone mount, but it couldn't get as close to the phone if it was attached to the front. And from the back it would be blocking the screen.
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| Another view of the smartphone mount. |
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| Another view of the smartphone mount. |
I hope you have found that interesting. Basically, the point of this video, and now the article, is to show that you can use what you have on hand.
*Any text labeled with an asterisk was generated by Gemini AI as a way to enhance detail of the article by providing definitions. I did look over the text, but at least keep it in mind.