GoPro Hero 8 Black Stabilization

Is it as good as they say?

My first foray into the world of action cameras was when I bought a GoPro Hero 4 Black in 2015 and brought it with me on a three month trip through Asia and Europe. That little camera accompanied me everywhere and got almost daily use in Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Germany, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, England, Sri Lanka, Japan and finally back home in New Zealand.

It was so useful having such a small camera that I could take pretty much anywhere, but one limitation quickly became quite clear — shaky video! While that tiny camera could shoot beautifully detailed 4k or super slow 120 fps video, playing it back on a large monitor at home would reveal footage that was disappointing because of how wobbly and shaky it was.

The solution — stabilizer software and gimbals

I discovered an application called Mercalli that does a really good job of stabilizing GoPro footage. It is excellent and I do recommend it. However, it adds extra steps to your workflow and increases the overall time required to edit a video. It also sometimes introduce odd looking artifacts into stabilized footage that was extremely shaky to begin with.

In late 2016 I bought a Feiyutech WG gimbal. The difference it makes is night and day…