Recently Colin suggested I talk my wife Katie into making some sandbags to weigh down lighting stands on set. One of us also had the idea of making them out of canvas shopping bags. Like me, I think Colin envisaged Katie simply filling a canvas bag with sand and sewing up the top.

As you can see, she went to a lot more trouble than that…

Some of my new sandbag collection

Considering that you’ll pay the best part of £20 on eBay for one of those, I think £3.55 is a pretty good deal.

Once Katie had started making them, she couldn’t stop. I ended up with five of the one stone saddle bag kind shown in the video, and three smaller ones for counterweighting arms. Thanks Katie!

If you want to see some prettier things Katie has made, be sure to visit her shop at Katiedidonline.

And once again, if you’ve enjoyed this post or found it useful, please do consider clicking the Donate button in the righthand column. All the money goes into making Stop/Eject and you’ll get a credit on the film, an invite to the premiere and access to my super-useful indie film budget exposé How to Make a Fantasy Action Movie for £28,000.