New Tilta Cages for C200, EVA1, FS5 & URSA Mini Pro

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by Tim FokFebruary 22^nd, 2018

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A new line of Tilta cage has been announced for medium sized camcorders. The shoulder-mount configured rigs are designed specifically for the Canon C200, Sony FS5, Panasonic EVA1 and Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro.

Tilta has become quite well known for it’s camera-specific cages. We’ve seen heavy support in the top and low end spectrums of the market, with skin-like support for RED as well as modular designs for mirrorless cameras.

Tilta has now taken a turn to the mid-range market, targeting specifically the Canon C200, Panasonic EVA1, Sony FS5 and Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro.

Speaking on the line as a whole (each is very similar, just ergonomic shifts to cater for specific cameras) the Tilta cage is broken down into 4 main components:

Bottom Plate with shoulder support
Top Plate
Rear battery plate
Extension arm

Bottom Plate

The bottom plate is the heart of the system. It has 15mm LWS rods on the front, rosettes on both sides, 15mm rod mounts to the rear (non pass-through) and padded shoulder support.

Pretty standard stuff, but there are a couple of nice unique features.

The plate is both VCT and ARRI Dovetail compatible – two solid industry-standard mounting options for tripod mounting.

There is also a slider plate that mounts directly to the camera, this allows fore/aft adjustment to perfect balance on the shoulder, but the neat little feature I like is the lens/lens adaptor support on the front.

Lens mounts and particularly lens adaptors on mid range cameras are not so solid; you can get a lot of play with the likes of the Sony FS5 and metabones adaptor.

This lens support can help prevent movement, mounting to the plate itself keeps things very compact.

Extension Arm

The extension arm bolts to the rosette on the side of the bottom plate, extending the native camera handle for better ergonomics. The extension cable is brand specific (Sony/Panasonic/Canon etc.).

It would’ve been nice to see one-touch adjustment to this arm like we see with other manufacturers.

Top Plate

The top plate is where features changes model to model.

All offer camera to native top handle mounting in a compact fashion. The Tilta cage for the EVA1, FS5 and USRA Mini Pro all have front and rear 15mm rod support.

Fronts can be used for accessories like magic arms for external monitors, follow focus motors, recorders etc. The rears are reserved for the battery plate.

The Canon C200 Tilta cage top plate doesn’t feature front rod support, instead has a rosette on the rear for the battery plate, and “precision fitting and grip for Optional C200 top Handle”.

Battery Plate

All battery plates are primarily designed to mount via the top plate of the Tilta cage. I really like this way of rigging; it gives you the ability to strip the bottom plate if you want to go lightweight; it also gives you greater adjustment of fore/aft on the camera on the bottom plate.

If you prefer to mount them on the bottom plate, this can be done via hex screw and simply using the 15mm rods on the bottom plate.

Battery plates are available in Gold or V-Mount, and have the following outputs:
• (2) 12v DC outputs
• (1) 8v DC output
• (1) 14.8V PTAP output

Availability is expected early March 2018 for each Tilta cage, with pricing range from $650-$730.