PetaPixel‘s Chris Niccolls and Jordan Drake aren’t the norm: one of them presents while the other one operates the camera. Modern content creators typically work alone, and that includes me. That means the same number of tasks that are enough of a burden for two full-time jobs is somehow supposed to be crammed into one person.
To make that work, you have to make compromises. You have to find clever ways to reach the same quality bar but with half the manpower. It was before, honestly, incredibly difficult. But these days, the Osmo Pocket 3 is everywhere. It is a cheat code and it does make content production as a solo creator much, much easier.
But it costs $520; it costs over $600 if you want to get all the nice accessories that, again, make production that much easier. They’re optional of course… but are they really? It got me thinking, why do I need the Osmo Pocket if I already have an iPhone? In my case — an iPhone 16 Pro.
For the last couple of years, I’ve been told that the iPhone is a fantastic video camera — by Jordan Drake, specifically. So if I’m already carrying this around with me all the time, why would I need to pick up another camera that serves the same purpose and promises the same capability?
The Necessary Tools
The Osmo Pocket has been talked about at length for the last year and I’m not going to tell you anything you don’t likely already know. It’s small, it has a fantastic gimbal, the tracking is pretty darn good, the picture quality is good too, and the battery lasts more than long enough to get through whatever scenes I’m trying to shoot.
It is a fantastic little camera. But, as I said, so is the iPhone. Sure, it has a smaller sensor but if you’re shooting with the main camera and doing so in ProRes Log, the image quality in fair to good light is just about as high quality as I’ve come to expect out of V-Log from the Panasonic GH7. It edits seamlessly into Jordan’s YouTube footage to the level that I didn’t even realize he was using his iPhone with relative frequency.
But the iPhone doesn’t have a gimbal, which, as I said, is one of the major selling points of the Osmo Pocket. So, to level the playing field, I picked up the two nicest ones I could find as a point of comparison: the $160 Insta360 Flow 2 Pro and the $270 Hohem iSteady M7. The former is a brand-new gimbal that taps into Apple’s DockKit as a direct line to the iPhone’s built-in tracking technology. The gimbal is Insta360, sure, but the performance is supposedly good because it’s made by Apple.
The Hohem ended up on my radar after I was chatting with Becca Farsace, who featured it in a couple of her YouTube videos lately. It is more versatile than the Insta360 since it doesn’t require an iPhone to work right (if you’re in love with your Samsung Galaxy or Google Pixel, you can use the Hohem with no problem). It has a detachable camera that sits on the phone mount and uses Hohem’s tracking technology.
Insta360 Flow 2 Pro
Let’s start with the Insta360 Flow 2 Pro. Design-wise, it’s pretty small and easy to bring with me — that’s the selling point of the Osmo Pocket so we are off to a good start. I actually have the original Flow Pro here to compare and it’s kind of wild how much of an improvement Insta360 made to this thing in less than a year. This new model is smaller, easier to deploy, and has a more secure MagSafe mount (which I prefer versus the clip mount that you can use if you want).
It has a telescoping neck if you want to get a taller shot, which the Osmo doesn’t offer. It has physical controls like this trigger and buttons and these are there to mainly manage the direction and aspect ratio of the iPhone. For more than that, you need to use whatever capture app you like.
That’s the nice thing about the built-in support for DockKit. Because of it, a ton of apps work in tandem with it, so you don’t have to use Insta360’s app if you don’t want to. Since you’re probably going to want to shoot in ProRes Log if you’re shooting on iPhone (since regular footage looks over-sharpened and bad), that means you can use the native Camera app or even the Blackmagic app, if you want.
If you use the Insta360 app though, you get what the company positions as even better tracking by melding Apple’s DockKit with Insta360’s AI tracking. I haven’t noticed a major difference myself.
Perhaps more useful is that when you’re using the Insta360 app, you can use gesture controls to start or stop recording or tracking, which is super useful if you are trying to shoot yourself, like I am. Unfortunately, gesture control doesn’t work if you’re also trying to shoot in ProRes Log. This seems to be an iPhone limitation — it can’t handle that much data processing. That’s a shame since it means I basically never use the gesture controls. So if you need to tap a subject to engage tracking but you can’t do that if you can’t see the screen, how do you effectively track with this thing?
Insta360 says that it recommends a second iPhone (which can connect remotely to the gimbal) or an Apple Watch. Since most normal people don’t have a second iPhone, I don’t consider this an actual fix. As for the Apple Watch, while it does work for remote monitoring, I couldn’t get it to reliably activate tracking. Luckily, holding down on the gimbal’s trigger activates tracking, so even if the iPhone display is facing away from me, I can start tracking. I’ve found this to be extremely reliable.
Hohem iSteady M7
PetaPixel has covered the Hohem iSteady M7 at length in its full review, but some of that information bears repeating. Hohem’s tracking capability is, at least as far as I could tell, unique because it includes a separate camera system along with a wireless screen and remote. That means I can shoot high-quality footage on my iPhone and have built-in tracking as well as a monitor to see myself, all in one system. More on this below.
I find the physical controls on this thing to be hilarious. It’s like the company didn’t want to keep it simple because it wouldn’t look “professional” so they put a bunch of buttons, knobs, and dials on here that we probably don’t need. For example, there is a dial on the side of the camera and the default setting for this is changing the color temperature of the small LED on the front of the tracking camera module. Yes, it can be reprogrammed to other tasks like tilt, but when there is a joystick on the main control interface, this feels redundant and unnecessary.
The biggest downside of Hohem’s system is that it’s enormous. Given that it’s for a smartphone, it’s comically large and I don’t love traveling with it. Since the idea is that I’m going to need to capture content on my own and the odds are high I’ve got something else to talk about other than my stabilizer and iPhone, it’s downright cumbersome.
In The Field
I think the Osmo Pocket feels most at home when the camera is facing you, which is thanks primarily to the lovely little screen on the back. It’s a small, unassuming camera system that feels easy to talk to and doesn’t attract a lot of attention. You could say the same of the Hohem thanks to that little camera and selfie screen built-in to the handle.
Conversely, the Insta360 gimbal feels like it was designed to be better at capturing content that is in front of me rather than me. Insta360 did the best it could with making a pocketable system designed to work with the iPhone but it feels weird that my best monitor when capturing video of myself is just a little mirror on the back. Does it work? Sure. But I don’t have to like it.
All three of these systems offer an easy way to set them down on a flat surface. The Osmo Pocket has a detachable mini tripod and so does the Hohem. Insta360 went a step further and built one into the handle that conveniently slides away when you’re not using it.
Both of the iPhone gimbal solutions offer a telescoping neck, which means you aren’t capped on height adjustment like you are with the Osmo Pocket. This is super helpful when you don’t have a monopod or tripod, which I certainly don’t like bringing with me when I’m out of the house if I can help it. The less stuff I have to schlep, the better.
Tracking
When you’re capturing content on your own, the biggest and most important feature is tracking: the camera has to stay on me and if I’m not actively holding it, it better follow me and what I’m doing.
I think that in most circumstances, the Osmo Pocket does a perfectly fine job of maintaining tracking on me. It’s certainly not the best though and an area that DJI can iterate on for whenever it makes the next version of this handy little camera. I’ve also noticed that in more challenging lighting conditions, it tends to hunt a bit, which is distracting. However, if I stay mid to bright light, it’s rock solid.
The Insta360 Flow 2 Pro is easily the best of the three and does a fantastic job. When it’s locked onto a subject, it sticks, so leveraging Apple’s technology clearly pays off here.
Hohem’s is no slouch either, but it ranks the weakest of the three options. It won’t cause any hunting or pulsing since the tracking camera is different from the capture camera, but that means you’re at the mercy of the autofocus on the iPhone keeping you in focus. It usually does, but you won’t know until you review the footage later.
Overall, it is more susceptible to losing a subjects behind objects and has a slightly jerky look to the footage. It’s minor, though, and I think that the benefits of the remote screen and controls are worth the tradeoff in pure tracking capability.
Accessories Are ‘Optional’
While you certainly can take the bare Osmo Pocket and your iPhone out and start capturing videos, if you’re trying to make the best-looking footage, you’re not going to be doing that. As mentioned, the iPhone’s video prowess really only jumps off the screen once you use ProRes log. And, like all log footage, you can’t just set everything to auto and expect your footage to come out. Log expands the dynamic range, but you want to try and lock ISO and white balance. To do this, you’re going to want to keep highlights from blowing out by using ND filters.
Filter Attachment
The iPhone might be a great camera but the design doesn’t take to accessories particularly well. The addition of MagSafe certainly helps when it comes to things like batteries and external storage, but the three-camera array just stinks. To get around it, you’ll need a case designed to handle specifically designed accessories. I’m using the Moment system, but there are others.
Look, these work, but I have never been a fan of these cases for everyday use because the mounting points love to catch and trap dust and grime as well as catch on my clothes. That means I have my regular case that I use most of the time but if I want to shoot video with my iPhone, I have to swap it out for my Moment case.
All these same issues are mirrored on the Osmo Pocket except the little camera was made with the use of attachable accessories in mind. DJI makes a set of three ND filters and they easily magnetically snap to the front of the lens. Just like that, you can shoot in D-Log without blowing your highlights.
The problem with DJI’s little camera is getting to those manual settings, however. I really don’t love the menu system on this camera. Half the time I feel like the touch screen isn’t recognizing my touch and I also have the hardest time with minute adjustments like getting the exact ISO or shutter speed that I want. Also, all the words used in manual settings are too big for the space DJI has on the tiny little screen, so you end up seeing these move like a little stock market ticker. Everything just feels mashed and claustrophobic.
There are pros and cons to the interface on the iPhone and the Osmo Pocket, too. On iPhone, as challenging as it is to get accessories attached, at least I have a really large screen with which to input my settings. It’s really irritating that I still don’t get waveform — neither of these camera systems has it — and I’m forced to use a histogram. That said, it at least is visible on the iPhone. The screen of the Osmo is too small to show it effectively, but at least I can see what the camera is capturing in real-time as opposed to my iPhone options.
Pros and cons, like I said.
The thing is, if I’m afraid a scene is going to have troublesome lighting, I can just use the standard recording profile on the Osmo Pocket because it looks pretty darn good. It’s not over-sharpened and the large Type 1 sensor in this camera is one I know will produce some great-looking video. The same can’t be said of the iPhone. For me, it’s log or nothing because the standard profile is very over-sharpened and, well, looks like smartphone footage.
Audio Options
Something else to consider is audio. While you certainly can shoot without a dedicated microphone, your results will be markedly less professional sounding. I’ve argued that if you have to choose between getting perfect visuals versus perfect audio, take the latter. Blown highlights and shaky footage are far more tolerable than bad audio. Bad audio makes people turn a video off or, as they said in my day, change the channel.
For this, DJI offers a direct and immediate, no-hassle link with its Mic 2. Just turn both on and they instantly recognize each other and connect. The audio is pretty great without a dedicated capsule and, if you get a good one, it can accept those too. Just don’t get DJI’s capsule — I think it sounds pretty bad.
Shooting on iPhone is more complicated. I’m using Rode’s Wireless Micro and these connect with the iPhone using a dedicated USB-C dongle. It is also at the whim of speaking back and forth with Rode’s app which is extremely bare bones. During my testing period, the Rode mics refused to connect, so I couldn’t use them. If I didn’t have the Osmo Pocket and the DJI mic, I wouldn’t have been able to shoot a video at all.
It Comes Down to Usability
At the start of this comparison, I posed the question, “If the iPhone is so good, why would I need an Osmo Pocket?” Let’s dissect that.
The iPhone takes great footage, but the design of the device was never meant to handle this kind of content capture. While the Insta360 is good, it requires an iPhone case, ND filters, a working audio solution, and the willingness to talk to a mirror on the gimbal in order to work right. While the Hohem option gives us that screen so we can monitor ourselves, it’s not the actual camera that’s shooting me which is always a risk. Also, the thing is just so darn huge.
So while true that I always have my iPhone with me, in both cases, the Hohem and the Insta360 result in me having to carry something that’s at least as large, if not substantially larger, than what the Osmo Pocket is in its entirety. Even when I’m all set up and using these tools with my iPhone, it just feels like both systems were built either to get around the iPhone’s inherent weaknesses for this type of work or aren’t well designed to be used to capture footage of myself at all.
That’s the Osmo Pocket’s strength. It’s a product tailor-made to shoot what all the companies these days are calling “vlogs.” Yeah, vlogs are dead, but content creators still need to aim a camera at themselves so they can talk about something to an audience. That’s not a vlog, but the concept of what would have made a vlog product great still stands.
While I think the footage out of the iPhone can be better than what I can get with the Osmo Pocket, the planets have to align for that to be true. Most of the time, the Osmo Pocket’s footage — even standard profile footage — looks better. I’m not willing to sacrifice the ease of use of the Pocket to get to the highest highs that the iPhone can reach — the distance between these two products is not that vast.
Plus, and I’ll again reference something Becca Farsace said, it’s just nice to have a camera that is not my iPhone. I am not turning it on and getting distracted by emails or notifications. It’s just a flip, it’s on, and I’m working.
There was a time that I would have been impressed by a “Swiss Army knife” like thing such as the iPhone which can be so many things to me. A camera, a computer, and an editing platform. But these days, I’m more concerned with having something that makes specific tasks easier and, if I’m lucky, more fun.
