This page was retired in 2013 and remains for archival and reference purposes. Bad links were removed or updated in May of 2017, but much of the information in the text is not current. For a current listing of (ever in flux) Chicago area operators your best reference is the Illinois section of the Steadicam Operators Association website.
Below is a list of various Chicago area Steadicam Operators, several of which I typically refer to clients when I am unavailable for a particular date. Also: several of these operators have rigs which are better suited for flying heavier cameras (ie. 35mm Panavisions ,the Genesis, Imax format, 3-D shoots with two Red Cams) than my gear, which tops out at 35 pounds of camera capacity. Both Tom and Mark are also highly experienced jib owner/operators which may make them a great fit for your production. I believe that John is on full time with HMS Media, but check out their site if you need a full service production company with an experienced Steadicam Operator on staff. I think that Lawrence is currently busy running his rental house (Daufenbach Camera), but he does maintain an SOA listing. I'm not sure what range of steadicam services
ChicagoSteadicam.com is offering, but they've utilized this URL for several years.
Chicago Steadicam Rentals
Both Janice Arthur in Chicago and Red Star Pictures in Madison have Steadicam gear available for rental. Magnanimous Media has both a Steadcam Pilot and a Zephyr at very reasonable rates. In this setup video they note that Steadicam shooting requires an experienced operator. If you’re looking for an operator for a Pilot rig (and I am not available/affordable) I can refer you to Northwestern Indiana based Guy Rhodes. Vividline Cinema is renting both a Glidecam Smoothshooter (with a single section arm) and the handheld Glidecam 4000.
