- So what exactly is this thing,
and how can you use it to get some awesome video footage
of the properties you're trying to sell?
Well, we're gonna talk about all that
in the next few minutes, stick around.
(upbeat music)
So in case you didn't know,
there is an emerging marketing tool
that's really starting to make a big splash
in the real estate world.
And that is video.
And video is something that most people
as of right now don't do
when they're listing properties,
and to be fair,
there's a lot of properties
that don't really justify video
because they're either really cheap
or they're just not much to look at.
So video isn't really a huge help.
But there are some properties out there
that are really high end homes,
or some kind of land that has
really unique, distinguishing features,
and video can be an awesome, awesome marketing tool
that can make a huge effect
on your ability to sell a property for more,
and to sell it faster.
Now one of the problems with real estate video
is that the people who do try to pull it off
and include videos in their listings
typically don't do a great job of it.
A lot of times they're just pulling out their phone
and just kind of walking through a property
and calling it good.
And I think that's usually
better than nothing in some cases,
but it really just kind of looks really amateur
and unprofessional,
and a lot of times the footage is all shaky
and just hard to follow,
and it doesn't make the property
look nearly as good as it could.
In my opinion, a good real estate video
usually needs a few key components
in order for it to make the property actually look good.
First of all, the property
needs to be in good working order,
it should be staged,
it should have everything
looking as good as it possibly can aesthetically speaking.
Some properties are disgusting.
They don't look good at all.
They're old, they're outdated,
and in some of those cases,
I think video, you know,
might not be the best fit for it,
but if it's a property that looks beautiful
in any way, shape or form,
then there's a fair chance
that video could add a lot to that property's
visual appeal to buyers on the market.
It's also really important to have good lighting
when you're shooting video,
and this is something can actually be sort of difficult
when you're shooting inside houses,
'cause some houses don't have great lighting,
or they don't have very big windows
and there's not much daylight that comes in.
So this can be kind of a struggle,
but if you shoot at the right time of the day,
and if you get the right lighting
and do the proper white balancing,
it can look very, very good,
if you do it right.
Another important component is to have
professional and creative footage of the property
with high quality shots, creative angles,
and good movement throughout the property
so that it doesn't just look boring,
it actually looks interesting
as you're taking the viewer through the property.
And then lastly, it's really important
to have good editing with the proper narrative,
order of shots, background music,
information displayed at the bottom,
so that the viewer can really understand
what they're looking at.
And it's kind of fed to them in a way
that's fun to watch
and interesting to see.
Now, if you're not a professional videographer,
it can actually be really, really difficult
to pull off the whole aspect of getting creative shots
and taking the camera through the property
in a way that looks good with stable footage
and something that's just easy to watch.
'Cause a lot of times,
you need some good equipment
in order to get the right shots
with the right movement,
and this is something
that not everybody has on hand.
It is not really easy for just a property owner
or a real estate agent
to just pick this stuff up
and do it with ease
in order to make it actually look good in the end.
And that's what I wanted to mention to you,
this little gadget that I just learned about recently.
It's called the Geranos 3 Axis Stabilizer
from a company called Glide Gear.
And the reason this thing is so cool,
as weird as it looks,
is that you can actually take a DSLR camera
like this one right here,
and mount it on the top,
and this thing will stabilize the footage for you,
so that literally all you have to do
is just move this wand around,
and your footage will look very stable with no shakes.
It's gonna be really easy to watch.
And it's actually got these electronic motors in it
that make basically no noise at all,
and it just makes it extremely, extremely easy
to get great footage.
You don't have to have any prior skills
or working knowledge of how to make it work just right.
You literally just balance it correctly on this thing,
turn it on, pick it up, and it's good to go.
OK, so once you get your camera mounted on this thing,
and this took me, I don't know about a minute or so
to get this balanced just right.
On your first time, it might take
a little bit longer than that,
but once it's balanced,
this is a battery powered motorized gimbal,
so you just hit this little on off button on the side,
and you'll see this light flashing.
And then it'll come to life like this.
And as you can see,
when I move this around,
the camera slowly follows,
and I can kind of do this weird movement stuff,
and, I mean, assuming I don't hit anything.
The camera stays very, very stable.
And it's also got this up and down switch
so I can push it and the camera'll move up like that,
nice and smoothly,
or I can push it down
so it will go down like that.
Just a really, really nice piece of equipment
that's easy to use.
This particular camera is a Canon T4i
with a 24 millimeter lens.
This lens is really light weight.
The camera is not the most light weight,
but sort of on the lighter end
for Canon cameras.
Something to keep in mind is that
this particular gimbal, it has to have a weight
of no more than two point six pounds on this thing,
and based on the type of lens you're using with the camera,
it is possible to exceed that weight limit.
So that's just something you'll wanna be aware of.
I actually had to weigh mine
with a little postal scale
just to make sure it wasn't too heavy for this thing.
If you've got a mirrorless camera,
like a Panasonic GH4
or a Sony A-series camera, something like that,
those are well below the weight limit of this thing,
and they work really, really well
with this kind of gimbal.
Again, like I said, this thing is battery powered,
and the battery is actually gonna last a long time.
Like, I literally, I've used this quite a bit,
and I have not recharged these batteries
since I started using this thing.
So it's probably been running actively
for about, I don't know, eight hours now,
and I've heard they last up to 12 hours
but I haven't gotten to that point yet, so.
But yeah, it's just a really, really
nice piece of equipment.
It makes it really super easy
to get really, really smooth shots.
And I'm actually gonna show you
a little compilation of shots
that I took with this stabilizer just a few days ago,
so you can kind of get an idea for how it looks.
Let's quick just check out
some of the video footage that I took,
and you can get a better idea
for just how good it can make your footage look.
And keep in mind here,
I probably didn't get the right lighting levels
with any of this footage,
and again, I'm not a professional,
I'm purely an amateur.
I don't do this for a living.
It's just something that,
I think it's a good representation of
how much better this can make your footage look,
and how easy it is to do that.
Because it took me pretty much
no skill to pull this off.
(upbeat music)
So there you have it.
As you can see, the footage looks awesome.
Once you get that smooth footage,
it's really not hard to
just edit those clips together
and put some nice music in the background,
and make it look nice and pretty.
And also keep in mind,
this thing is actually designed
for these big honking DSLR cameras.
If you've got a DSLR camera,
or a mirrorless camera,
which is really nice
'cause they have these interchangeable lenses
and you can make the footage look
about as good as anybody can hope for.
But if you don't already have one of these,
you don't necessarily need to go out and get one.
These actually work with smartphones.
You could mount a smartphone on here
or a GoPro camera if you have one of those.
And for that matter,
this company that makes and sells this
is called Glide Gear.
They actually have a cheaper
and more light weight version of this
called the Leios,
and I'll include a link to that one
beneath this video as well.
And the Leios is just a smaller,
lighter, cheaper version of this,
where it's just meant for smartphones
and GoPro cameras,
and not these big DSLR ones.
And the price is less than half
of what this one costs.
So if you're just looking for that level,
that's available too,
and that may even be
a more ideal fit for a lot of real estate agents
who don't necessarily have
all this big fancy camera equipment,
but they do have their phone,
and they wanna get the best, smoothest footage that they can
with just a quick trip to the property
and a lighter weight version of this same tool.
So be sure to check that out
if you think that might be a better fit for you.
And just so you know,
Glide Gear did send me this thing for free
so that I could do this review,
but this is not a paid video,
I'm not getting paid by them for this,
so I really, I have no obligation to tell you
that this is an awesome piece of equipment.
I'm just telling you it's awesome
because it is awesome.
I've been really, really impressed with this.
It's probably my favorite piece of camera equipment
that I own right now,
just because it makes the job so easy
to get really professional looking footage.
Be sure to check this thing out,
because it is awesome,
I couldn't recommend it more,
and I think it's just a really helpful tool
for a lot of people out there.
So check it out.
Thanks for watching,
and hopefully I'll see you again soon.