I am not really bothered by handheld style footage for my GoPro videos, so I never really considered purchasing a gimbal for myself. Now. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to have one personally and of course, I’d love to have the opportunity to try out different brands and models to provide reviews here for my audience.
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Do I Need a GoPro Gimbal? Which One is The Best?
For myself, personally, for what I shoot, which is family stuff, I just was never dying to drop $300 on a gimbal.
But lately, I’ve been trying to take a more cinematic approach to my family videos. I shot some footage of us going to find a Christmas tree… typical, right? I shot at 1080, 60 FPS so I could get some slow-motion action happening. Also, I had Protune on with the color set to flat.
Normally I shoot 1080/30, everything on Auto, so Protune is usually off. But I’ve been changing things up a little bit lately. That is an effort to utilize the GoPro more, create better-looking footage, and just experiment with some different settings.
Actually, I’ve been playing with LUTs and so I’ve been shooting with Protune on. In a recent post, I answered this question about LUTs which has to do with coloring your videos when you’re editing.
And looking through this footage, I can kinda see how a gimbal would be beneficial, especially when I slow it down and here where I’m walking. I could get some really smooth pan shots, I think they’d just be smoother.
But at the same time… there’s nothing really wrong with the footage I have. I’m happy to have the footage and family videos are not about perfection. Right?
So do I really even need a GoPro gimbal?
The way I see it, there are pros and cons.
Pros & Cons of using a Gimbal
Pro: obviously your footage will be smoother. It is a handle, and I always recommend you use your GoPro with some type of handgrip so that’s good. The karma grip also powers your GoPro that’s cool, it kinda keeps the juice flowing us know?
Cons: it makes your GoPro less “grab n go”, less waterproof/family proof, and it’s one more thing you have to keep charged up and one more thing to carry around and it’s not really a “just throw it in the backpack” type of accessory. Ya know?
Which GoPro Gimbal Would I buy?
So I get questions about gimbals a lot, and often it comes down to “well which one would you buy?”
To be honest, I think I’d buy the Karma Grip if I was in the market for a gimbal. Actually, here are the gimbals that I’d be putting in my shopping cart in order of preference:
GoPro Karma Grip –
Amazon: https://amzn.to/3ntGRc9
Best Buy: http://bit.ly/2yHIjLH
Walmart: http://bit.ly/2hC9rbF
Removu S1 on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3nsYc4S
Evo Gimbal on Amazon: https://amzn.to/394OJZq
Feiyu Tech G5 on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3k9zAfK
Related: Casey Neistat Style Tips for GoPro Videos