I have a little Joby Gorillapod, which is a really cool and lightweight way to have a tripod with me.  The other day I was pondering where to get a solid, cheap stand for my iPad, rather than paying the ridiculously high prices for “official” iPad stands I’ve seen, when it occurred to me to use the Joby!  I bent the front two legs upwards to catch the iPad base, and bent the back leg mostly flat for stability.

This works well for testing out the iPad game I’m developing, leaving the iPad positioned neatly next to my laptop.  Way more convenient that picking it up over and over throughout the day.  It’s also great for rolling a Netflix movie, or streaming some Magnatune while I work.

To be fair, this is a Gorillapod “Original”, which only supports 325g.  It tends to collapse under the weight of my Nikon D5000 in all but pretty standard configurations, and it will also bend a bit if you really mash on the screen, so when pressing the home button it’s best to put some fingers behind the iPad for counter force.  Some of the newer models support up to 5kg.  I bet one of those would be really solid.

Joey iPad Stand

While the price of a Gorrillapod is around the same as most iPad stands, you can get a whole lot more use out of it, especially if you are a photographer.

Oh, and FWIW, that super cool audio program shown in the second image is iSequence for iPad.