What’s one small piece of gear that made a bigger difference than expected?

[Stuthetraveler]

I'm trying to pair down extra equipment, unnecessary redundancies and I’ve been thinking about how often we focus on the “big ticket” purchases but sometimes the smaller accessories end up having the biggest impact on set. For me, things like better cable management, a well-designed boom pole holder on the cart, quality RF distribution, or simply having the right pouch arrangement have probably saved more time than upgrading a recorder.

 

What’s one inexpensive or overlooked piece of equipment that ended up becoming indispensable on your cart or bag?

[syncsound]

roll up camp chairs. I have a pair of them, sit in one and mix off the other:

 

https://www.camptime.com/collections/chair/products/tall-roll-a-chair

 

 

 

 

[Mungo]

small bottle of hand sanitizer in belt bag: Originally introduced in the days of pandemic, this remained a well used tool for me and is always appreciated by the whole crew:

 

When shooting doc, you shake a lot of hands, come into dirty environments and you don't always have a sink in reach before eating your sandwich.

[Philip Perkins]

Magliner, w/ shelf , handlebars and wheel brakes.  Has worked on all but a very few mostly out of town gigs I've done in the last 30 years.  I like sound gear but this thing has been a boon companion for me.

[Lucas]

Do you use the Magliner mostly for transport purposes or do you have (semi) permanent equipment installed on it?

I'm looking for a 'smallish' gear trolley, something with a bit more horizontal workspace than the Zuca carts yet still compact. 

[JustusWirth]

1 hour ago, Lucas said:

Do you use the Magliner mostly for transport purposes or do you have (semi) permanent equipment installed on it?

I'm looking for a 'smallish' gear trolley, something with a bit more horizontal workspace than the Zuca carts yet still compact. 

 

The Adicam carts might be worth a look. I find them a bit too expensive though.

https://adicam.pl/product-category/carts/ 

[Philip Perkins]

I've been through most of the permutations of the Magliner thing, from a fully built-up permanent sound cart (that needed ramps to get in and out of my van) to the permanently unbuilt style that gets folded up after each use.  As you are aware, there are a huge number of accessories available for that platform, so you can convert the thing from one type to the other pretty easily.  For my downscaled old-guy jobs my current Magliner stays in the portable/foldup mode, and various recording rigs get set-up on the shelf on location.

 

Two small cool things:  "Lav Snake" -you all know what this is, a boon to rigging lavs on tight-pantsed talent, and a simple Switchcraft TRS female to XLR-3 female, that allows you to plug headphones into any xlr line and hear what's going on.

[Jason Nicholas]

Velcro cable ties; what did we do before? Really anything that has to do with cable organisation. I remember basically the first thing they taught us in film school was how to properly coil and pack away cabling. The comment was something to the extent of “you’ll be doing this the rest of your life so might as well learn how to do it well.” I thought of this the other day at work when I was attempting to pack away a 15m three phase extension.

[OB1]

I understand this is a grip thing but I have two in my kit. Cardellini clamp. So helpful in so many ways...

[Philip Perkins]

I love the Cardellinis (I bought mine from Steve Cardellini himself!) but be careful using them to hold mic fishpoles, esp. at long extensions with larger mics+zeps!

[JonG]

3 hours ago, Philip Perkins said:

I love the Cardellinis (I bought mine from Steve Cardellini himself!) but be careful using them to hold mic fishpoles, esp. at long extensions with larger mics+zeps!

Definitely use a proper boom mate for those situations 

[fieldsound]

My ultralight arm with mini cardellini clamp comes in very handy all the time.

 

On that note, I think solid grip equipment in general is always worth the purchase price. Quality stands, grip heads etc can really make the job a lot easier. Sometimes I have to adjust the mic dozens of times over the course of an interview day, and I am always grateful for my trusted Matthew’s stands and knuckles that just work, as compared to the cheap ones I bought earlier in my career.

[Philip Perkins]

My only issue has been Grip Depts who decided that my Cardellinis (and etc) were "party favors" and grabbed them all at wrap!

[Johnny Karlsson]

On 8/24/2026 at 3:07 PM, Philip Perkins said:

My only issue has been Grip Depts who decided that my Cardellinis (and etc) were "party favors" and grabbed them all at wrap!

I put my name and number on every single piece of gear to the point of OCD. And even mark things with "SOUND" if it's something that could be mistaken for belonging to other departments.

[Aprikot]

Sachtler Poncho

 

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1115084-REG/sachtler_sn606_rain_poncho.html

[Wandering Ear]

Lav bullet is my #1 favorite small accessory.