Ironically, we turned up to the super-busy Zhiyun-Tech stand at IBC 2018 with a DJI Ronin-S and a 5D Mark IV. Despite us bringing the competition’s main gimbal rival to the Zhiyun Crane 2, the folks at Zhiyun-Tech were nice enough to let us film a quick overview with Chung Dha, who was serving as a brand ambassador for the new Zhiyun Crane 3 LAB (prototype) gimbal.
We posted about the upcoming Zhiyun Crane 3 previously here so you can check out that post if you missed it.
In summary, the Zhiyun Crane 3 LAB is a concept/prototype of basically a DJI Ronin-S rival with a handle that is extended backwards so as to accommodate a more comfortable “flashlight” shooting mode. The gimbal is said to be the first sinlge grip gimbal to be designed with an overhead support in mind, which in the video below you can see Chung Dha demonstrating.
Payload is ample – at around 4.5kgs you can put a Kinefinity Mavo, Canon C200 etc. although it will get heavy and a bit unwieldy. All of these single grip gimbals in my opinion become a bit too much once you put anything bigger than a 5D mark IV, but that’s just me.
Note: Apologies for some missed focus here and there, I blame our lack of experience with the gimbal (it was our 1st day using it, as it arrived a day before IBC) and the 5D IV autofocus was set on face tracking and it often gets confused when there are no faces in the foreground.
Our goal was to use the DJI Ronin-S as a replacement for our tripod and our Panasonic GH5S, which we used on the previous 3 days of filming at IBC. This was our last day and we decided to experiment and take barebones kit.
Zhiyun Tech are aiming for an $1100 USD price point, which in my opinion is a bit too steep, but the unique design may appeal to lots of people so it remains to be seen what it can do once it ships; a date for which has not been yet finalized. Many thanks to Zhiyun Tech for letting us film this video and to Chung Dha for being awesome and demoing the kit for us.
Check out Chung Dha’s YouTube channel here, which has awesome filmmaking tips and tutorials videos.
Find out more about Zhiyun-Tech on their website here.
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