Creature from the Blog Lagoon 25: A Stable Genius

It’s time for me to join the 2010s (yes, yes, I know, we’re in the 2020s) by shooting video along with my still photography. I go into the world of video journalism a little reluctantly - I don’t want to drag along more equipment and the form factor of DSLRs just doesn’t work for for me when shooting handheld video. What do to, what to do…?

I could get a dinky little video camera, no bigger than a soda can, but that would take up a space in my bag I’d rather devote to snacks. Priorities. I could go for an action cam - a GoPro for instance, but again, the form factor for this kind of thing is just not quite right. Then it struck me!

Once I came to, I remembered the perfect solution for me - a handheld stabilized video camera. Behold the DJI Osmo Pocket.

It’s tiny, about the size of a harmonica or a Snickers bar. I can handhold this and get very stable footage, and I still have room in my bag for wine and cheese.

This thing shoots up to 4K at 60 frames per second (I won’t need that) and the image quality, when things are set up correctly, is excellent. (There’s a newer version but its lens is wider, too wide for my needs.)

The sound isn’t great but it’s easy to plug a small microphone into it, including lav mics. This doesn’t take the place of a more serious video camera - I’ve got three different types so I can shoot HD or up to 4K with those when I need something a bit more feature-filled.

I have’t shot any real video yet, I’ve just been too busy, but I’ll post an update when I get sample footage worth watching.

(Note: I bought this used; no consideration provided by the manufacturer.)