So, the other day I learned that hand held video is a bad idea if maximum quality is important.
Hand held has its uses, mostly linked to accepting the hand held look.
A proper Gimbal is needed (or a dedicated device like the OSMO Pocket) unless you are willing to accept the semi shaky ‘steady cam” look.
The down side of setting a camera up as a video device only, is when requested to quickly grab a still, you take what you get with all the wrong settings. This is the first stills shot taken with the G9 (over exposed jpeg, on auto). I won’t judge its performance based on this.
If you feel you have hand held covered, moving quickly undoes that. Big heavy cameras have an advantage, but again a handle and some weight is still an acceptance of a certain look, just for that looks sake. The reality is, documentary and street level shooters hand hold most often, most others do not.
I have come to realise this by doing it and it is not for me.
The useless handle and less useless T-Bar have come back into the fold as accessory supports when the camera is loaded down, usually on a tripod. It is actually ideal for this, packing away flat when not needed.
A bit unwieldy, but far better than the four inches of mic hanging out the back.
The handle is long enough to take the Zoom H5’s length, the T-Bar at the back (which being used as a handle prohibited) then adds three shoe mounts and allows for enough room for easy handling. I guess it will also be useful to mount and dismount the camera, but that will be short term, so no real danger of hot-shoe damage.
For most gimbal moves, limited as they will be, I have the Pocket.
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If I should decide to go down the cage road again (I did*), the Niceyrig looks good. It has much the same utility as the dedicated Smallrig for half the price, but also fits the GH series (you never know) and with an extra cold shoe mount. It may also have better HDMI cord protection.
I have ordered a Smallrig handle for a Ronin Gimbal that will give me a left hand handle option with or without a cage. On the cage, it can be set wide enough to protect the flipped out screen. This may also be useful for the OSMO pocket, adding some rigidity to the phone/camera option.
I also have a Smallrig screw in handle coming, which is lower profile than the cold shoe one I have and can be fitted to the side of the cage. This may seem odd, but fitting this handle along the side of the cage instead of a side only handle may allow for wrist rest-stabilising while focussing. It can also be fitted as an up-down side handle if needed, maybe at an angle to.
ed. I have since ordered the Niceyrig cage for my kit, simply to have the option. With a cold shoe adapter it will take the existing handle properly. I can now also add a side handle to that or any number of other accessories.