At first blush, most slider dollies seem too small and simple to be of much use to a professional cinematographer. However, just about anyone who has shot with a slider dolly even once can tell you how surprisingly useful they can be. The reason is due to their lightweight and simple design. Instead of having to lug around multiple bags full of dolly and track gear, slider dollies can be mounted right to a tripod you already own. This allows cinematographers to save money on equipment and be quick and versatile since they only have to set up a single piece of gear.

Features like these already make slider dollies like Cinevate's Atlas 10 FLT enticing for cinematographers, but like any good company, they've included more than just the standard fare of features. We'll look at each to see if they give Cinevate's new offering the edge.

The Build

In Greek mythology, Atlas was an ancient Titan who was sentenced by Zeus to hold the entire heavens upon his shoulders. Not an easy task. In the same way, Cinevate's newest slider, with the same name, has the unenviable task of having to handle both the stress of the environments that shooters find themselves in - and the weight of their gear. This is where the Atlas 10 FLT shines. Cinevate has dressed the Atlas for success by building it out of tough CNC milled aluminum and steel. This not only makes the Atlas sturdy, but gave us confidence that the product would be around as long as our camera would.

In true professional style, the slider had a non-reflective, black satin anodized finish for stealthy operation and a dual-rail linear bearing system for smooth operation.

We were also happy to see that the slider included a nylon lock for a damage-free way to transport the slider without having the dolly sled move, a standard 3/8-inch mount for attaching almost any tripod head, and the ability to choose either a 26-inch rail system or 35-inch for longer dolly and truck moves. We reviewed the 26-inch rail system and found that it was more than adequate for about 90 percent of our dolly moves, making the dolly a handy product to have on any set.

The Vertical Kit

Of all the improvements made to Cinevate's newest slider dolly package, the most dramatic would have to be the vertical kit. For an optional $419, and $179 for the counter-weight, you can mount the slider vertically for short jib moves without having to buy thousands of dollars worth of jib or crane equipment. The vertical kit works by attaching a rope and pulley system to a counter-balance that slides along the opposite side of the dolly sled. Though the rope felt a little out of place on such a solid piece of equipment, we found it easy to attach and found that it worked surprisingly well.

The counter-balance is a hollow box that can be filled with sand or water in order to balance the weight of the camera. This proved to be a very useful feature as it kept the weight down when traveling with the entire unit. When we got to our shooting location, we simply tossed a water bottle into the hollow box to balance the camera, and we were on our way.

Though this is a great feature, we did find the amount of time it took to attach the kit to the Atlas to be very consuming. Cinevate kindly thought to include Allen wrenches to allow you to attach the vertical kit (and save some cash in the process), but we wish it would have simply required a couple of thumbscrews to mount instead. However, it is possible to keep the vertical kit together and still get horizontal dolly shots if you won't be mounting the unit to a tripod, so for some shooters, this may not be such a bother.