Virtual Studio Series The Desk Mounting Setup that David and Tim Use and Why | EP 655

Virtual Studio Series – The desk mounting setup that David and Tim use and why

1. The desks 01:20
2. The mounting system 05:58
3. Protip about iMac mounting 09:24
4. Let’s talk about chairs 10:09

Read the full episode transcript below:

00:25 David Blackmon: Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of WP The Podcast brought to you by WP Gears. I’m David Blackmon.

00:35 Tim Strifler: And I’m Tim Strifler.

00:37 David Blackmon: Today at episode 655, we returned to our virtual studio series. This is part four first three parts we discussed. Cameras lighting and microphones today. We’re going to dive in to our actual desks, set up the physical desks that Tim and I bought. We have the same one, and we’re going to talk about it, mounting systems and stuff. What we have our lights mounted to and our cameras mounted to, and computer’s mounted to and so on and so forth. Cause it can get pretty dang crowded on this desk. If you don’t have an organized system and way to go about doing it. So Tim. Drum roll, please. What desk did we choose to go with?

01:20 Tim Strifler: Yes. We chose to go with the standing sitting desk by uplift desk. And I say standing, sitting because it’s motorized and it has hydraulics or something to automatically press a button and automatically goes from standing to sitting or vice versa. And, uh, one thing I do want to quickly say is if you’re starting out, you don’t have to get all this high end stuff that David and I use. It’s just that we have been working at home for. Five six plus years. And so it’s like, are we spend a lot of time at these desks and using this gear and stuff like that. So like we’ve, we’ve upgraded right over the years to, to what we have now, but by no means is you need to go out and buy a, you know, a really expensive, uh, standing desk, unless you can afford it and see the value. But we’re going to talk about kind of why we chose this setup. Um, first of all, I will say. Standing desks are huge in terms of health benefits. Uh, their studies have been shown that sitting for long periods of time is terrible. It’s just absolutely terrible for you. But here’s another thing that a lot of people don’t realize is standing for long periods of time is also not good for you. And so really the most ideal is being able to change positions and move and stuff. And, uh, the, the standing sitting at desk, uh, allows you to do that. Um, Because it’s motorized and you can quickly with the touch of a button raise or lower your desk and go into stand mode or whatever. So, um, hugely, hugely beneficial for health purposes. Um, and there’s some, you can definitely get some cheaper ones. We got kind of a higher end one and that’s because I believe in paying for quality and having it last. Um, and so. You know, there’s ones you can probably find on Amazon or stuff that are maybe cheaply made and, um, you know, it might work for a year and then it stops working and yeah. We didn’t want to mess with that. We thought spending a lot of money on the front end to get something that lasts. And we’ve had these wet three, three plus years now. David’s still going strong?

03:20 David Blackmon: At least. Yeah. Yeah. It’s been three plus years. And, um, I’ll tell you, mine still looks brand new. I mean, I’ve put it through hell. It’s been through a couple of moves, cross country. I traveled in an RV, you know, “digital nomad” for five years. And two of those years were with this desk in the RV. So as I went down the road, traveling all throughout the continental US, this desk went along with me and, uh, I got tell you the quality is superbe, you know, for three years old. This thing looks like it just came from the factory.

03:54 Tim Strifler: Yeah, no, it really did. The quality is great. The mind survived a move from Texas to California as well. Uh, and yeah, I think they start around $500. Um, but depending on the, the wood that you get, the size that you get. And then there’s a bunch of different add ons to it. It goes up from there. So, you know, be prepared to spend the money. But, um, I like this is, has been a fantastic purchase and I have zero regrets. I’ve been very, very happiness. As I know, David has to obviously.

04:26 David Blackmon: Yeah. I want to talk about couple of things. Cause I think Tim and I have different size. And when we say size, we mean the length of the desk. How wide the desk, how much desk space we actually have. I purchased what I thought was the 60 inch. It’s a five foot desk and I actually bought the 72 inch. And which is really big. Now I gotta tell ya. I love the 72 inch. I have a ton of room on this desk. Now you got to have place to put this bad boy, cause it’s, you know, six feet wide, you know, and uh, most rooms will fit and stuff, but, um, that’s typically not an issue, but, um, I didn’t realize how much I would really enjoy the extra 12 inches of desk space. So Tim, am I wrong in thinking that you have the 60 inch? 

05:22 Tim Strifler: I have, I can’t remember which one it is, but it’s, it’s definitely the smaller one than you have. And I’m actually that’s, I guess would be my one regret is I wish I would have gotten the wider one like you did, because it, I mean, I’m not like cramped, but because like now, which at the time we weren’t doing as much of the. You know, the hardcore video stuff. And now that we’re getting into a lot more of the video stuff for the courses and everything in live streaming, there’s more gear that’s getting added to my desk. And so I’m wishing I would have had a little bit more desk space. And then it’s also nice just to have more room in general as David mentioned. So I would say if you’re not sure, go bigger. If you, if you have the space for it.

05:58 David Blackmon: All right. Well, let’s talk next about our mounting system. Obviously we’ve got quite a few things mounted to our desks and I’ll talk about everything that we’re mounting to our desks. And Tim can tell you which one we went with. So, um, on our desk, we have our cameras, our lighting. Our computer monitors, um, our microphone stand, you know, so pretty much everything that we’ve covered in our virtual studio series is sitting on this desk, man, that sounds like a crowded desk. How the heck do we make it all work, Tim?

06:42 Tim Strifler: Yeah, so we, we have a mounting system. I’m trying to find the exact product name in my Amazon orders…

06:49 David Blackmon: “Wally” it’s w a L I is the Wally. Desk Mount system, I guess is, I don’t know if I’m pronouncing it right. Wiley Wally. I say,  “Wally”, my mind says “Wally”, even though it’s one L it’s w a L I is the actual name of the, um, you know, the company that manufacturers these, you know, this mounting system.

07:15 Tim Strifler: Yeah, exactly. And so basically, uh, We followed a YouTube video that kind of walks you through. So we use that Wally system, as David mentioned that you can get on Amazon. Um, and then we. They’re they’re really meant to be monitor arms, but we configured them to be able to Mount other things to them. And so, for example, my camera, my Sony A6400 camera is mounted to one of those, uh, like monitor arms. That’s been reconfigured with a tripod. Um, what’s it called? The camera? Tripod camera. Mount ball. Head..

07:53 David Blackmon: Ballhead. Yeah. It’s like a, it’s like a “ballhit”.

07:56 Tim Strifler: Exactly. And so, so then I can basically, I can move my camera from left to right up and down if I want, I have it right where I want it now. So typically don’t move it. Um, And it works great. And then I have another camera coming off of that, uh, main Mount, uh, that has my secondary camera that has an up and down arm as well, as well as the tripod ball mount. Um, and so yeah, it works out really great. Um, I originally wanted everything mounted to that system, including my iMac. Um, but the iMac really, really. Can’t be mounted. Cause it has a permanent stand. You cannot take your iMac stand off of it. Um, it like it, they didn’t make it, you get to be able to be removed. And so I have my secondary monitor, which is that old Thunderbolt display that, um, Apple no longer makes that. Stand was able to be removed. And so I have that mounted and it’s on a swivel arm and I can move it up and down and side to side and everything. Um, but, but yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s great. Having everything mounted actually frees up a lot of space so I can have, you know, the different things that I need, uh, like our, uh, Scarlet, uh, audio interface. And then, um, we both also have a stream deck, which, uh, hooks up to the live streaming software and you can press the button to change different scenes and stuff like that. So, um, having everything mounted, frees up the other part of your desk to be able to have other stuff. 

09:24 David Blackmon: Absolutely. Yeah. I’ve got a similar setup, same setup and stuff. Uh, and, and it’s just been, uh, A life saving, you know, thing to have, you know, I’ve got my monitors on, um, on the mounting arms and stuff, and I have an iMac also that’s sitting on the desk, but you know, when I purchased the iMac, it gives you an option when you buy the iMac, if you want to have that mounting system, as opposed to just the arm. So yeah. Pro tip. If you’re looking at buying an iMac and you want to futurize, you know, maybe Mount it on an arm system, like the Wally system that we’re talking about, you’re going to need to make that purchase. When you buy the Mac. Um, so just it’s …

10:08 Tim Strifler: Visa Mount Addon..

10:09 David Blackmon: Yeah. Visa Mount Addon. Thank you, Tim. So yeah. Uh, all right. Well, that kind of takes us, you know, from our desk, I’m going to give a little bonus out there cause we don’t have a chair series, but Tim and I, you know, obviously if you’re working at your desk for long hours, you need something comfortable to sit in. And I copied Tim, you know, I was buying at least two office chairs a year and they were cheap office chairs from Office Depot. I’d go, I’d spend 50 bucks, you know, and I’d, I’d get a new chair. And then eventually, because it was a cheap chair, the padding would wear out. And you know, when you’re sitting in it, the majority of the day and stuff, just after six months of use, it just kind of got uncomfortable, well, wear out. So. You know, I noticed one day that Tim had this really bad ass looking chair in a video call we were doing. And, um, it was DXRacer and he looked, it looked like a gaming chair, cause I’m a gamer from way back. And actually that’s what it was. It was a gaming chair, funny that, uh, also had an office chair, which I, you know, even actually purchased and stuff. And I gotta tell you, I’ve  had this chair. When we bought the desks and stuff. So I’ve had it for about three years. I know you you’ve had years longer than me. And this thing is still rock solid. Hadn’t worn out a bit, you know, and it’s like the day of on it. So even though it was, you know, quite a bit more expensive, like a five, $600 chair. It’s more than paid for itself. Cause I’m not buying a couple of chairs a year anymore.

11:48 Tim Strifler: Yeah, exactly. And I agree. I highly recommend the chair and I think I got mine quickly after moving to Texas. So that was in 2015. Um, and now I’m back in California, but, um, So, yeah, it’s been, I’ve had mine for, for almost five years now and it’s, it’s great. Now I’m looking at the DXRacer website. And so they, as David mentioned, they make gaming chairs and they also, they had a, they called it there. So whole chair, small office, home office chair, but I don’t think they carry it anymore. Um, but if the game chairs are, I mean, they’re very, very similar than the ones we have. And so you can’t go wrong because basically. Gamers are sitting in chairs for hours and hours. And so that was my thought process. Well, if this company is making chairs for people that are sitting gaming for hours and hours, then it’s probably a great chair to sit in and, uh, having a. Really high quality chair is, is huge. If you work from home full time, you’re gonna spend a lot of time in that chair. Now we talked about the standing desk and how important that is, and it is hugely important, but you can’t stand all the time nor should you. And so you’re going to be sitting for at least half the time, more than likely. And so yeah, you need a really good high quality chair. Otherwise, if you’re like me, I don’t think I mentioned this yet. I also had the cheap chairs like David talked about. Yeah. And I was, it was literally giving me neck problems and I was having a lot of, uh, neck pain that was turning into really bad headaches and everything. And so once I got this chair, like, this is no exaggeration, like my headaches were gone because it was a high quality chair that gave me the posture and support that like my spine and neck needed and, uh, Yeah, it was, it was literally a life changer. Like I know that sounds dramatic, but it’s true. 

13:37 David Blackmon: No, it’s not. Seating is important. It’s just like shoes, people under estimate the value of really, really good shoes. Especially if you’re on your feet all day, it’s no different a salesperson working in retail that is standing for eight hours a day. What’s the most  important thing that they’re going to need? Support shoes. Well, we’re sitting at a desk all day. We need a good chair. So do not underestimate the value. I love shoes too. So I said, I said, but shoes. Oh, but shoes. Yeah, these are our, but shoes. I thought you said you love shoes. I love shoes too. So I’m a, I’m kidding. I’m kind of a shoe, uh, a female version in a male’s body who has lots of shoes, you know? So, yeah. Alright. Well tomorrow we’ve got another great episode, episode, six 56, how to juggle work life and home life. When you work at home with your family, man, that can be tough. Sometimes. Tim. Until tomorrow. We’ll see you then.

14:39 Tim Strifler: Take care. Bye. Bye.