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3-Axis Brushless Gimbal Stabilizer: buy or alternative?


JazzBox
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Hallo!

When Movi came out I was astonished, but the price was so proibitive that I just had to look away. I used a Flycam Nano DSLR for a while, but I don't really like it. I'd like to run on all the uneven terrain etc... and with a Flycam it's not possible.

 

Now some other brands made their version of this great instrument: I saw some reviews and the two stabilizer I find very attractive are Came 7800 (in this days at a special price) and DJI Ronin at a higher price.

http://www.came-tv.com/assembled-32-bit-came7800-3-axis-camera-gimbal-p-582.html

http://www.dji.com/product/ronin

 

Here you can see a genial short produced by DJI with the amazing BTS:



 

I'm totally after one of this stabilizer but, unfortunately, I have not all that money, even if they are a lot cheaper then the Movi counterpart.

Do you think it is possible to build or use some other things to achieve that stunning results or it is better to save some bucks and think to buy one of those stabilizer?

Which one would you buy? Came 7800 or DJI Ronin?

Thank you very much!

 

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TCSTV had a nice video on the Ronin about a week ago, looks nice...

 

There's a topic on EOSHD about these type of 3-axis systems: '?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>  ( >and ).

And there are already some cheap solutions availlable...

 

tE4mMEN.png

 

Of course, everything that's a little bit more DIY and cheap will come with challenges. That's the price you pay if you don't want to pay the price.

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I have the DJI Ronin and can tell you the build quality on it is top notch. I met another shooter who had the Came (forgot which model) and he said he ended up returning it because it didn't work for him. I let him try my Ronin and he said the overall quality versus the Came is night and day. I don't have experience with Came gimbals at all so I can't really comment on it. Also one thing you need to consider is that Came is overseas, so if you have issues and need to return, it's going to be a headache.

 

As for the Ronin, the rig is VERY HEAVY. Unless you have the arm strength of a NFL player, I don't see anyone lasting a day or even half with this rig alone. I have both the Blackmagic Production 4K and Pocket cameras... and even on a stripped down load (Pocket + DP4), I don't see myself lasting half a day with it. I just ordered Atlas 2 rod camera support the other day so going to see how that goes. With the Atlas, I should be able to last all day with the Ronin.

 

Having said all this, the Ronin is simply amazing. When I first received it, it took me 10minutes to have it up and running. Now it only takes me less than a few minutes. 

 

Side note.... I was at Photo Plus Expo last week and had a chance to toy with Freefly Movi and Defy gimbals and both are lighter than the Ronin, but the prices are also higher.

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keep a lookout on eBay. I got one by a DIY guy for 300-something. It doesn't look fancy but works fine. It's limited in weight to something like a nex5n with a kit lens, or possibly a bit heavier. It's a 3-way brushless gimbal and came preconfigured for my cam since happened to have the same on.

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Won't this crop your footage and potentially cause warping artifacts, though?

 

Crop, yes -although they claim there would be no crop because they use some sort of interpolation to "rebuild" the missing part of the frame, which I doubt will yield decent results-. There should be no warping if you use 3 axis stabilization. Warping would come from trying to correct perspective. I believe this device works like a reverse process of After Effects old motion tracking stabilizer, using data from the accelerometer to create a motion path.

 

What I guess would be unaviodable is shooting at high shutter speeds, since no matter how well the footage is stabilized there's no way to correct the baked-in motion blur from a shaky cam at 1/50. No doubt the best way to have a steady shot is shooting a steady shot, but this device could be very useful in many instances -such as following a walking subject- in which there'd be little crop or motion blur.    

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  • 3 months later...

I'm about to pull the trigger as well. I picked up the Lumix GM1 when it came out, hoping to be able to use it with one of several announced single-handed gimbals like the Mastor Sailfish, but as far as I know, none of them ended up being released. Now that pricing has come down, I've been going back and forth between the soon-to-be-released Came-Mini ($1,188) and the new Defy G2X ($1,995) for my Lumix GH4, but decided I'd get the Came. I can use the $800 savings to pick up one of the new Veydra cinema lenses.

Mastor-Sailfish.png

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I'm thinking an Oly E-M5 II and my $35 Merlin-knock-off will work good (enough) for me. Will test this out next week.

Figure if I'm going to spend $1.5K for stabilization, maybe having a camera that does 80% of the work might be a better bet.

I was able to produce simple and short handheld dolly shots with the old M5 just by doing a little tai-chi body control, so I'm encouraged that the new and improved Oly 5-axis will offer capability to elegantly handle more assertive movements.

I like the idea of being able to grab steady cam level shots with small and very portable rigging...or no rigging at all.

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Have you ever tried MOZA 3-axis handheld gimbal?

I should say it's lighter than Ronin and more functional and professional than Came-TV.

I have a friend from Indonesia who bought a Came-7800 first BUT return it back for a MOZA.

Take a look.  http://www.gudsen.com

 

​Looks very interesting ! With built in wireless remote and 

I'm about to pull the trigger as well. I picked up the Lumix GM1 when it came out, hoping to be able to use it with one of several announced single-handed gimbals like the Mastor Sailfish, but as far as I know, none of them ended up being released. Now that pricing has come down, I've been going back and forth between the soon-to-be-released Came-Mini ($1,188) and the new Defy G2X ($1,995) for my Lumix GH4, but decided I'd get the Came. I can use the $800 savings to pick up one of the new Veydra cinema lenses.

Mastor-Sailfish.png

​I was also interested in the defy G2X and in the nebula 4000 (although it have some downsides), but the MOZA seems like a nice alternative too with built in wireless remote and wireless video output...

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There is another handheld gimbal coming but with 32bit controller and dual IMU

​Is it a new version of the "Feiju 3-axis Gimbal for GoPro" on steroids ?

would you give us the manufacturer's name ?

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