Bradman's Full Review: Ikan Corporation Ikan PT1000 Teleprompter Kit PT10...
We have started to shoot more "talking head" style sessions when someone can't attend some far away event. In the past we would use a laptop right under the camera and scroll their script by using Word and pretty large fonts.
Aside from looking very amateurish, it was actually difficult to get things working smoothly. Sometimes the laptop would get glare from the lights and then sometimes it just didn’t want to sit correctly below the camera. We finally did some digging and decided to buy the Ikan small teleprompter kit.
It consists of a small 8” monitor, the connection cable for a VGA port on a computer, a small AC power supply, a mount for the monitor, and the teleprompter software.
You can mount the monitor to the hotshoe on your camera but we chose to use a Bogen “magic arm” and clamp it to a leg of the tripod. However you decide to do it just place the monitor right above or below the lens of your camera. You connect the monitor to your laptop/desktop and just use the Ikan as a second monitor. If you setup your system with clone displays (where each display shows the same thing) then you can look at your screen and adjust the speed to scroll the text as your client does the talking. Most people really appreciate having a teleprompter.
The software will import text and RTF files so you can get something in Word and just save it as a RTF file and then open it in the software. We had some issues with the scroll speed not being consistent, it would move along slowly and then if we tried to increase the speed one increment it would then scroll by much faster. I called the tech support and we worked over the phone but the tech said that is how it is supposed to work. We’ll play with it a bit more and see if we can get used to it.
We have been very happy with the build quality. Apparently Ikan is famous for their monitors. We have no complaints, although one client said that the monitor was a bit small. If you are in the field I think it would be fine, but for studio work where weight/size is not as much of an issue you might want to think about a larger setup. If we find some more money we may move up to a larger screen and a partially reflective glass setup like the PT3000.
Bradman
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 700 Driver Availability: Windows, Linux, and Mac
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