Camera stabilization is always a tricky game, with no easy solution. Cheap stabilizers are often difficult to balance, and expensive ones are often bulky, and make mobilization a problem. Introducing MōVI by Freefly, a stabilization system that is expected to change the DSLR movie scene forever, and its already got award winning videographer Vincent Laforet’s stamp of approval.
Using a 3 axis gyroscope to stabilize the camera, the MōVI system looks light, incredibly portable, and quite frankly, amazing. This gif perhaps illustrates it the best.
The downfall of this new tool for videographers everywhere, comes in the price. Currently priced at $15,000 (with a $7500 option rumored to be coming soon), it makes it a difficult purchase for your amateur videographer and targeted more towards production companies. But with new ideas like this, certainly more consumer friendly options will be coming along as time goes on, making shaky cameras a thing of the past. Watch the videos below for more examples of this amazing technology at work.
MōVI in Action (Quick Video) from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.
MōVI BTS from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.
[via Vincent Laforet's Blog & Gizmodo]
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beautifully filmed.
This is not a new technology, they've simply added a handle, which is a brilliant idea. Freefly builds Cinestar multirotors, a popular brand of UAVs. Other companies make similar mounts, simply add handle and computers.
If you know what you're doing and can find a DIY computer for these things (there are a couple brands, but they're backordered into oblivion), you can build something similar with minimal hardware hacking for around 2500-3000 (depending on the controller, servos, etc) that holds cameras up to eight pounds, and with a fully DIY setup I'm sure you could get it down to 1500 or something like that, and build it to hold full-weight cameras.
I know RC groups are'nt as stunned with this as the rest of the world is..thyeve been playing with this tech for years. Any link into that 1500 or something diy project?
It's a guess, lot's of people have hacked at this for a while. Without weight to take into account, it'd be a lot easier I imagine. You'd need three servos and gearing, a radio, controller, computer (with gyros etc), wiring, etc. This one is done with all piping, it weighs way more than our photoshipone mount though.
Kind of reminds me of this video from 3 years ago...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewK7NkcCFCk
You guys must realize that 15k is nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands of dollars people/Hollywood spend on steadicam rigs that can't even produce shots like this does.
There's a lot of diy development on camera gimbals going on in the RC world.
http://diydrones.com/profiles/blog/list?q=gimbal
Although most of these are of course for Sony Nex's and GoPro's, the control programs are largely the same. Servocity sells what is basically the core of this setup for under 2 grand.
http://www.servocity.com/html/pan_tilt_roll___accessories.html
Freefly's product is purpose built for drone use, and as such, makes concessions on price to achieve a lighter weight that, while important for long days of shooting, is not necessarily critical for function while being used handheld. For instance, a proprietary gimbal motor may have thinner wire in the stator to achieve more turns, and then be encased in an aluminum heat sink housing so it can be (relatively) overdriven and used as a direct drive system. Servocity's product uses more traditional motors and a kevlar belt drive.
Check out StableGimbal.com. They offer gimbal systems more powerful and versatile than the MOVI M10 and DEFY G5 and the price range is very fair for a high quality system.