ikan PT1200 12" Portable Teleprompter Kit

I've been hired on by a company to start creating product videos for them.  They want me to head out and pick up a teleprompter.  I don't know teleprompters, so they sent me this link on B&H:  www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1197299-R...pter.html?ap=y&smp=y

But the one they sent has mixed reviews.  Any of you know these things and tell me if this is a good brand or not?  

Sorry, I don't. I use a tablet with software that I downloaded from the App store. The software that I used was a bit quirky, but it worked. I vowed next time to see what else was available. I just propped it up just below the camera lens on a makeshift platform attached to a cold shoe bracket which was attached under the camera to the tripod. It did what I needed at no cash outlay. I have since seen a teleprompter type hood for use with a tablet for the projector since then, but don't remember where I saw it.

Real teleprompters are quite expensive, so it might be worth looking for this other way.
I will look too, and make another post if I find it.

Edit: There are several youtube videos about making a DIY Teleprompter. Even if you don't build one yourself, you will learn something from watching them. A Youtube search for "DIY Teleprompter" will find them.

Amazon also sells Teleprompters in the $100-300 range to be used with a tablet or cell phone. The design is very similar to the DIY versions, but already built.

Charley

Thank you.  Do you find limitations with your set up?

Well, what I did with the tablet worked, although a bit difficult to enter and edit the text, but since the tablet was below the camera, the person in the video was looking down at the tablet frequently and not directly at the camera lens. The tablet and software did provide a nice and easy to read set of notes for them to read from, but the result would have been better if they were always looking directly at the camera. It's more personal to speak and look directly at someone when having a conversation with them, and a teleprompter makes this work.

We rehearsed this, and I asked that they at least look up at the camera frequently, which they did in the video that I recorded. Having read all of the text ahead of time on the tablet several times before making the video helped refresh their mind, and the result recorded looked much like they were looking down to read from their notes to stay on topic. A teleprompter would have been better, because they would be constantly looking straight into the camera lens, but seeing the projected text on the teleprompter screen.

If I ever need to do this again I'll likely build something to function more like a teleprompter but still use my tablet as the text source. The freeware software that I downloaded did function well once loaded, to provide large text and scrolling capability. Giving them a remote button to start and stop the scrolling of the text would be helpful to allow them to stop the scrolling to respond to questions or if the text was scrolling too fast. Reaching for the tablet buttons did not work well.

I don't have a fat budget to pay for a professional Teleprompter that I'll likely only use maybe once a year, but I do want to improve on what I had before doing this again. Download and try out some of the tablet/cell phone software and look at the DIY teleprompter builds. Then decide if it's worth spending $1,000 or more for a commercial teleprompter. If you can justify it, great. I can't.

Charley