Camera Bashing…David Letterman’s Favorite Warm Up Trick

Camera Bashing…David Letterman’s Favorite Warm Up Trick

I hope Larry Thorpe and our friends at Canon are seeing this. You couldn’t ask for a better ad campaign premise on Canon durability.

This is Camera 2 on the set of the Letterman show. The bashing started long ago when Dave Dorsett was on this camera but continues with Al Chalino at the controls.

Before the show, announcer Alan Kalter comes out and starts the warm up with some help from Paul Shaffer and company. The second half of the pre show is done by David himself and the first thing he does on his entrance each night is to swing the hand held mic a few times and with practiced aim, let’s it land with a loud “thunk” on top of the Camera 2 lens.

With the camera in the full down position, he talks to the audience with one foot on the pedestal base and rests his right arm on the lens. The end of the lens is against his chest and actually, it looks extremely comfortable. I wonder just how many lens shrouds they’ve been through over the years? As for the handheld mics, I think they may last about a month (photo below in Comments) before they peter out.

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