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Their Problems Hinged On Lack of a Dolly
So this enterprising film producing company designed and built its own, now has a promising subsidiary business of building Porta-dollies for others.
By JOSEPH HENRY
/^ountryman-KlAxNG is a name long identified with ^ industrial and television film production. Be¬ cause this company recently encountered problems in renting camera dollies suited to its particular needs, it set out to design and build its own. Today, Countryman-Klang is an equipment manufacturer as well as film producer — maker of the Porta-dolly, a portable, hydraulically-operated mobile camera unit suitable for both television and motion picture photography.*
Inception of the Porta-dolly occurred when a Countryman-Klang crew was preparing to shoot a TV commercial in which the product was to be shown sitting on a rock in the middle of a rushing mountain stream. For this, a miniature waterfall and mountain stream set, some 20 feet in length, had been constructed on the studio sound stage. The script called for an overhead dolly shot of the wa¬ terfall and the camera then dollying down the course of the stream until it was almost directly
’"Countryman-Klang Film Productions, Inc., Times Bldg., Min¬ neapolis 1, Minnesota.
over the product. At this point, the camera was to drop down for a straight-on closeup shot of it.
To achieve this, a plank was mounted crosswise, where the camera head normally goes, on a dolly rented for the purpose — with the camera on one end and a counterbalance on the other. Eventually, after a number of takes, this rig did the job. But it was an arduous and time-consuming procedure. Thought headman Tom Countryman, there must be a better way.
It was this photographic undertaking and this thought that led Countryman-Klang to develop the Porta-dolly, which now is being marketed.
In the beginning, there were several primary con¬ siderations: The dolly must have a 360-degree boom. It must be sturdy, completely portable, and small and light enough to be transported in a station wagon. It must be inexpensive. It must be able to do almost everything a large dolly could do.
Countryman turned to the principles of racing car construction, with emphasis on light weight ma
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AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER, MARCH, 1963