How Photographers Are Using the Platypod Bracket & Bounce
One of the best things about launching a new photography tool is seeing what happens once it leaves the drawing board and lands in the hands of photographers.
The Platypod Bracket & Bounce was designed to give photographers a compact, flexible way to position lighting and accessories around the camera, but members of the Platypod Users Facebook Group are already finding their own ways to put it to work.
From event photography and vertical shooting to multi-camera video rigs, the Bracket & Bounce is quickly proving that it can do rather more than its name suggests.
Fast B-Roll at Corporate Events
Photographer Cesare Bonazza has been using the Bracket & Bounce while shooting corporate events, pairing it with a Leica D-Lux 8 for quick B-roll footage.
He wrote:
โThis bracket really works so well for video quick B rolls.โ
That is a particularly useful application for photographers who increasingly find themselves switching between stills and video during the same assignment.
Rather than building a completely separate video rig, the Bracket & Bounce can become a compact platform for adding accessories and positioning equipment exactly where it is needed.
Cesare also found another use for it, pairing the bracket with a Godox AD200 Extension Head.
That versatility is one of the advantages of a modular system. A piece of equipment that begins life as a flash bracket can quickly become part of a lighting, video or hybrid shooting setup.
Finding the Best Setup for Vertical Shooting
Nelson Charette raised another interesting use case in the Platypod Users Group: event photography in vertical orientation.
Nelson shoots extensively in portrait format using Olympus OM-D bodies including the E-M1X and E-M1 Mark III, together with lenses such as the 12-100mm and 12-40mm.
His lighting options include the Profoto A1 and Godox V1, so the question was simple: what is the best way to configure Bracket & Bounce when the camera spends much of the day turned vertically?
It is a good example of why an adjustable bracket can be so useful for event photographers.
Traditional flash mounting positions are often designed around a horizontal camera. Turn the camera through 90 degrees and suddenly the relationship between the lens, flash and subject changes.
With Bracket & Bounce, photographers have much more freedom to reposition the flash and accessories around the camera rather than simply accepting wherever the hot shoe happens to put them.
For wedding, event and portrait photographers who regularly switch between landscape and portrait orientation, that flexibility can make a real difference.
A Completely Different Kind of Rig
Then there is Michael Leon, who found a use for Bracket & Bounce that had nothing to do with flash photography.
Michael was photographing the famous Union Pacific 4014 steam locomotive as it travelled towards Philadelphia, a bucket-list event he was not going to miss.
He wanted to shoot still photographs with his Nikon Z6 III while simultaneously capturing video.
His solution was to mount both an iPhone and an Insta360 Ace Pro 2 to the Bracket & Bounce, supported by a Platypod Platyball. One camera recorded vertical video. The other recorded landscape video. Meanwhile, Michael's hands remained free to concentrate on shooting still images with the Nikon.
That is a pretty good demonstration of what modular photography equipment can do when photographers stop thinking about the intended use and start asking a better question:
What can I mount on this?
The result was a compact multi-camera rig capable of capturing three different perspectives at the same time.
For travel photographers, content creators, behind-the-scenes shooters and anyone producing both vertical and horizontal video, that kind of setup opens up some interesting possibilities.
More Than a Flash Bracket
Bracket & Bounce was created primarily as a flexible solution for working with flash, reflectors and camera-mounted lighting, but these early examples from the Platypod community show how quickly photographers are adapting it to their own workflows.
So far, we have seen it used for:
- Positioning flash and off-camera lighting equipment
- Working more comfortably when shooting vertical compositions
- Mounting compact video cameras
- Holding smartphones for simultaneous content capture
- Creating multi-camera video rigs
- Supporting hybrid stills and video workflows
- Building compact setups around Platypod and Platyball
And this is probably only the beginning.
Photographers have always been remarkably good at finding unintended uses for useful equipment. Give them a mounting point, an adjustable arm and a few minutes, and sooner or later somebody will attach something unexpected to it.
Show Us Your Bracket & Bounce Setup
If you are already using the Platypod Bracket & Bounce, we would love to see how you have configured yours. Maybe you are using it with flash. Maybe it is holding a monitor, microphone, LED panel or action camera. Or perhaps you have created a setup we have not even thought of yet.
Share your rig and your photographs in the Platypod Users Facebook Group. Your setup might just inspire somebody else's next shoot.
And if Bracket & Bounce is not yet part of your kit, these examples are a good reminder that it is much more than a single-purpose accessory. Sometimes the most useful piece of equipment is simply the one that gives you more options.
