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- Hey everybody, how's it going?
I think it's time to talk about Gimbals again.
For a while there, I got kind of sick of Gimbals.
I've tried a lot of different Gimbals.
I've tried the Nebula, the Moza Air, Zhiyun Crane 2,
Movis, I've tried a lot of different Gimbals
and I just kind of got sick of them.
I didn't really like any of them that much
but today we're gonna talk about this guy, the Ronin-S.
I did a little bit of a comparison
between this guy and the Crane 2,
but I didn't know that much about this Gimbal yet
and I hadn't used it that much so I couldn't
make a full review yet but now I've been using it
for a couple months and quick little backstory here.
Like I said, I've tried a whole bunch of different Gimbals
and I've never found a Gimbal that I really,
really enjoyed using so I was pretty skeptical of this guy
because I feel like all the Gimbals
are pretty much the same to be honest.
They're very similar, there's small differences
but they're really the same
and they kind of all have the same issues.
I was expecting this guy to have the same issues
as all the rest of the Gimbals,
but after really using it, real world experience,
spoiler alert, I have to say
this is my favorite Gimbal by far
but the real question still is will it replace
my good old handy, you can always trust on it glide cam?
Is this guy that fun to use
that I would actually start bringing this around
everywhere with me and drop the glide cam finally?
Okay, so my first experience with the DJI Ronin-S
was comparing it with the Crane 2
and just going back and worth between the two Gimbals
we would do one test and then use the other Gimbal
and be going back and forth.
You could right away see that there was a difference
between these two Gimbals and I would say
between the Ronin-S and all the other Gimbals,
there's definitely a difference.
We'll get into some of the differences,
but you could honestly tell right away
which I was really surprised by
because I was expecting it to be very similar
to the rest of the competition.
So let's just get straight into it
and talk about the pros.
So first off is the payload.
You can put a lot of weight on this.
I think it's 3.6 kilograms worth of weight,
so you can fit a lot of different cameras onto this Gimbal.
I've even seen a Canon C300 Mark II on this guy,
which is insane because this is a big camera
and to fit it on here and to get it balanced,
it's pretty impressive.
So it's super versatile in what
cameras you can put on this guy.
You can put reds on there.
I've had a lot of emails from other DPs
who are actually going with this
instead of the traditional Movis and all those guys.
They're just opting to use this
with something like a small red.
And not only the payload,
but actually the whole cradle space up here
allows for a lot of different cameras
to be mounted on here.
A lot of times, you kind of run out of space
and you can't actually balance the camera
because the cradle is just to small,
so I really like that about the Ronin-S.
I had no problems getting the 1DX II on there.
Right now I have the ESR but yeah, like I said,
C300, C200, reds, I've seen a lot of
different cameras on here and it's just the mixture of
you can put a lot of weight on here
and the big cradle, so that's a big bonus.
Then next and probably the most important is that
it's super stable, like actually really stable.
Again, when I was comparing it to the Crane 2,
I found this guy to be a lot more stable
than the Crane 2 and there was none of those
little jitters, those micro jitters
that are really just ugly, especially when you're
doing something like this flashlight mode,
it's really prone to shake or under sling.
Yeah, this guy did really well.
I wasn't noticing any of that micro jitter.
And then probably one of my biggest gripes
with pretty much all of the other competition
is that the horizon goes off really quickly.
So you start filming, it's looking great
and then all of the sudden everything's tilted
and all of your footage is gonna be crooked
and there's no quick, easy way of fixing that
on most of the Gimbals and to be honest,
I was expecting the exact same thing
to happen on the Ronin-S but I've never had that happen
yet and I've used this quite a bit
on a bunch of different trips.
It's never gone way off the horizon all crooked
so that is like, it sounds kind of stupid
and it should be a given but I'm telling you,
this is the first Gimbal that's actually worked
like it's supposed to and not gone all wonky
with the horizon and it's honestly the worst thing
when you're out there and trying to film
and all of the sudden everything's crooked and you're like,
well, I guess I'm gonna just have to zoom in
and rotate it in post.
That actually really sucks.
So yeah, that's something that this Ronin-S
has above every other Gimbal pretty much
that I've tried to date.
The app is really great.
It's simple for the most part.
I didn't have any issues with it.
I love that you can auto tune it in there.
Yep, no complaints there.
Charging, you don't need any extra chargers.
You just plug it in and it's really easy to charge
and I found that it lasts for a really long time.
Pretty much all the Gimbals last for a really long time
but this guy, you don't need to take out the batteries
and charge it on some separate chargers
like pretty much I think all of the other Gimbals have that.
I just like that.
The less stuff I can bring on a shoot,
especially when I'm traveling, the better.
So yeah, I don't wanna bring around other chargers.
But possibly the single reason why I enjoy
using the Ronin-S more than any other Gimbal
is actually these triggers and how they've programmed them
for you to use while you're filming.
So for example, you're filming in this normal mode,
you wanna go to flashlight mode,
just hold down the trigger, boom.
You're ready to go.
If you're a little bit off, you just double tap
and it just resets it completely.
Or let's say you wanna go to underslung so you just
hold down the button.
Boom, ready to go.
It's really quick and easy just to
change the different modes.
I didn't mean to do that selfie mode.
It's really easy to use the trigger
to move the Gimbal around and get those shots
that you need to get.
You don't need to go into the app and change anything.
You literally just press down the button,
boom, you're in that position, you're there, you're.
Like it's really quick and I think that's probably
one of the best things about this Gimbal.
It's all those little things about Gimbals
'cause they're a little bit cumbersome to use.
They're a little bit tricky, a little bit annoying,
so when things like this are done
where it just makes it really quick and easy.
I mean, I just really appreciate that
and then not only this trigger,
but then also let's say you're getting your smooth movements
but then something really fast happens
and you needed to follow it.
Well, you just press down the M button here
and boom, you're in this sport mode I think they call it
where you can do really quick movements.
This again is one of those things
where it sounds really simple and like yeah okay,
that's great, but it actually changes
the way you use the Gimbal
and that's one of the things that I always hated
about Gimbals was that they don't really feel
super kinetic when you're moving.
It kind of feels like a computer is controlling your camera
and not you whereas the glide cam,
it moves exactly where you move it.
Now when you press this M,
you have that kind of same feel where you move it
and the camera moves instantly.
There's no kind of lag or anything and then
when you want that smooth shot
so you're getting this fast shot
and then you want that slow smooth shot,
you just let go and there you go.
Now you got your slow mode again, nice and smooth.
Yeah, I just think it's really smart
what they did with this whole sport mode.
I think that's what they're calling it.
Now no Gimbal or product is perfect.
There's always gonna be issues,
so what are the downsides of the Ronin-S?
First off, I would say it's still a pain to balance.
All the Gimbals are so annoying to balance.
There's so many different things
and you move it a little bit and it goes too far
and then you move.
You're just going back and forth forever.
I can't wait till they just have kind of motors
that self balance or even little dials
to just dial it in instead of going oh, too far, too.
Like it's really annoying.
They have the little markings, but still,
it takes a while to kind of get used
to the whole balancing thing and I think
that is gonna be one of the big reasons why
a lot of regular people who aren't super into film making
won't be using Gimbals.
It's 'cause they're hard to balance.
Another thing is the focus wheel.
I'm not really sold on these focus wheels,
like I'm never gonna be moving and focusing
like holding the Gimbal with one hand
and then focusing at the same time.
It's not gonna happen.
It might be handy to focus up before
instead of touching the lens and then doing your shot
but I don't know, I think the focus wheel
is kind of a gimmicky, stupid thing
that I'm never gonna use,
but that's across the board.
I think pretty much all the Gimbals now
do a little focus wheel and yeah,
I just can't see myself using it.
And then the last big downside of the Ronin-S is the weight.
It is heavier than pretty much all of
the same sized Gimbals and that's a byproduct
of having the bigger cradle
and you can put more weight on there
and all that stuff, so it is heavy.
It is not a light Gimbal even though it is pretty small
and pretty manageable.
It's still, it's starts weighing down
your arm pretty quickly.
Other than that, it's honestly the first Gimbal
that I've used on multiple shoots and I've actually
enjoyed it every single time.
All of the other Gimbals I've used and I'd be like,
this is just not working the way I want it to
but the DJI Ronin-S has worked
exactly like I wanted to every single time.
There's still the downsides,
the weight and all that stuff,
but using it has actually been enjoyable
whereas all other Gimbals I haven't really enjoyed
using them to be honest.
And that's the reason why I've always kind of
gone back to the glide cam.
So the question is, am I finally switching
away from the glide cam?
Am I gonna put it on the shelf
and have it be apart of Travel Feels Matti Haapoja history?
I think it's time, I think it's time.
I think I'm actually gonna start
bringing the Ronin-S with me instead of the glide cam.
It works really well.
I love using it.
There's not one big gripe for me that kind of
deters me from using this, so as long as it lasts
and it doesn't die on me,
I'm gonna keep using this guy.
Gimbals are just such a sweet tool
to get that smooth footage.
It's a totally different look from the glide cam
and I really like the look of the Gimbals.
So yeah, I'm gonna start using the DJI Ronin-S.
But just because it's good for me
doesn't mean it's necessarily good for you,
so I always recommend that you test them out,
find the tool that works for you
because there is no one tool that works for everybody
but looking at the prices of the Gimbals
and what they can do, I think the Ronin-S
is probably your best bet right now
so I'd probably just test out that first.
Alright, that's it for this review.
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Alright, it's time for me to wrap this up,
start editing this video,
and I guess I'll see you guys in the next one.
Bye.
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