DJI hasn’t announced new drones for a considerable amount of time. But while flying machines are the company’s prized product, it also has a pretty amazing range of smartphone gimbals. And there’s a new member of the family now — the DJI Osmo Mobile 3. The third-gen handheld smartphone stabiliser has several new features, but the biggest is that the Osmo Mobile 3 folds up.
The Osmo Mobile 3 is shorter and smaller than its predecessors, which should make it more comfortable to hold for longer periods of time. That’s handy, considering how powerful smartphone batteries have become. Although smaller, DJI has not cut back on features. It even brought back the trigger button we lost on the second-gen unit.
Features from above
“When we began designing Osmo Mobile 3, we went back to the drawing board with the goal of creating a portable yet intuitive product that uses the latest DJI technology,” said DJI’s Paul Pan. “We are excited to introduce DJI’s first gimbal with a folding design and hope it inspires our customers to imagine new ways of recording content with their mobile phones.”
The smaller size, combined with more user-friendly controls, makes the Osmo Mobile 3 easier to use with one hand — in theory. We’d need to get our hands on one to see for ourselves. So we can try out changing orientation, which can now be changed by tapping the ‘mode’ button three times. Seems simple enough. Still, we want that hands-on time.
The gimbal can be controlled using the Mimo app, and allows you to configure a range of new features. Like Active Track (DJI’s computer vision tracking system), time-lapse, hyperlapse, panorama, gesture control, and a “story mode” that automatically edits the footage together in a convenient little package. You know, features that spring from the company’s drone expertise. Again, we so want to test all this.
We can account for the accurate and smooth af stabilisation tech built into DJI’s gimbals. It’s almost unlike anything we’ve seen on the general market. Thankfully, we won’t have to wait long to try out the new stuff. The Osmo Mobile 3 will be available locally by mid-September and will come in two variants. The standard version which includes the Osmo Mobile 3, wrist strap, storage pouch and anti-slip pads will cost R1,895. The Osmo Mobile 3 Combo, which also includes a tripod and a carry case, will cost R2,255.