I was called recently by professional photographer Mike Harrington runs a specialty packshot company called “The Packshot People“. As well as specialising in product photography Mike also shoots a lot of images for the stock image giant Getty Images. With the London olympics big in the news this year Mike was in the process of putting together a series of stills based on sporting activities that feature in the games. One of the images mike had in mind was of a cyclist on a rolling road with a London cityscape in the background.

Mike shot the cyclist in his studio and grabbed the skyline in London but he needed to create the rolling road part of the image and ideally wanted vehicle light streaks in the shot. At this point many people may have turned to photoshop but Mike’s one of those guys that’s not happy settling for second best when you can capture a real image.

When Mike asked if I had a device that would allow a camera to be tracked whilst keeping it stable I knew straight away that he was talking about a problem that we had already solved as filmmakers, he needed the Glidetrack Hybrid HD.

Mike borrowed my Glidetrack HD Hybrid and mounted his Hassleblad medium format camera to it. He then found a suitable spot beside the road and did a long exposure whilst sliding the camera along the track. The results were perfect providing a perfectly smooth blur of the road with the passing cars creating spectacular light streaks.

Here’s the composited image containing all three parts.

So many DSLR users have purchased Glidetracks and other sliders to enhance the video aspects of their shooting but I wonder how many have thought about switching those cameras into stills mode and getting creative with long exposure stills too.

If you want to find out more about the Glidetrack Hybrid that Mike used then see my Glidetrack Hybrid review.

For more information about all of the Glidetrack models visit www.glidetrack.com

Back at the beginning of 2011 I reviewed Glidetrack’s new Hybrid HD slider which I’ve been using ever since along with my trusty Shooter SD which I take with me on overseas trips or anytime when travelling alone and I need my kit to be portable.

The Hybrid HD has improved my results so much that I started to feel quite hindered when using the non Hybrid Shooter, especially as mine has been all over Europe with me and in that time has suffered some wear and tear along the way making it less reliable.

So when Alastair from Glidetrack contacted me a few months back and asked if there’s anything more I’d like from my Glidetrack systems my single response was to have a Hybrid SD model so that I could still benefit from having a small, light and easily portable slider and also be able to achieve the silky smooth tracking shots that the Hybrid HD provides. At the time Alastair replied with a simple ;)

Today a small brown box turned up on my doorstep containing the brand new Glidetrack Hybrid SD. The SD Hybrid provides all the benefits of it’s bigger HD brother, a hybrid bearing / sleeve carriage with a locking screw, adjustable feet that can be easily attached and removed and of course those famous balls!

The difference between the new Hybrid SD and my old shooter is like night and day, it has the same response as the Hybrid HD in that by just tilting the rail up slightly the carriage starts to roll under it’s own weight. I’m looking forward to getting a camera mounted and trying it out.

If you have an existing SD system the Hybrid parts are also available as an upgrade package for £205.20 which includes the Hybrid carriage and a pair of feet. This can be used to upgrade an existing Glidetrack SD system or any Igus system that uses the 10-40 rail.

The Hybrid SD is available now from Glidetracks website. The 0.5m version that I use costs £312, with a 0.75m version at £336 and a 1m version at £358.80.

For more information visit the Glidetrack website.

Here’s a video put together by Glidetrack showing a few more details of the product. It’s worth noting that the Hybrid SD carriage actually has more bearings than the bigger HD model offering extra smoothness for cameras with longer lenses that produce a greater weight offset.

And a few pics of the box being opened this morning, I’ll be posting a video review in the very near future once I’ve had chance to get out and put the new Glidetrack SD Hybrid to use.

Just as a side note, I’m very impressed with the iPhone 4s camera which was used for all of these pics!