Trying out 3 camera mounts on my mtb bike. Every shot taken with the Osmo Standard camera only, everything was carried in my backpack (blue bag bobbing into frame when seen from helmet mount camera pointing backwards), just the two of us on bikes. All done very quickly. I was just concentrating on how the camera handled the bumps etc, not trying to impress with our mtb skills ;) A couple of shots I put the camera on the ground or hung it from a branch (added post zooms). All shot 2.7k, 25fps. Auto. Not worried about fast shutter strobe as it was just to test gimbal. No "post" speed ups or stabilization added. I selected shots with bumps and shakes as most shots were too smooth and not enough drama - usually it's the other way around! I picked shots to show the camera taking bumps/shudder - look at the video from a cinematic camera point of view - not a "gopro shaky" action cam. On 55" UHD screen the feeling is amazing. Track is Yarra trail in Heidelberg Melbourne. Usually ride it much faster at night with headlamps, dodging wombats, kangaroos, tiger snakes, spiders in our face and the normal creepy crawlies...... only in Australia! Makes it far more interesting at night when you don't know what's around the corner or which way the track turns till you're at the bend. Play it on a big screen, select 1440/2k quality and wait for it to buffer, or play it a few times for it to get its quality. YouTube compression really struggles with fast action and foliage so it may look pixellated on some playbacks. Original edited footage quality looks great. Turn up the volume, Enjoy!

Great video and cutting. Can you tell us a bit more about which equipment you used to mount the OSMO? Obviously this doesn't look like you used the original OSMO bike mount, which I found rather rigid and causing vibration on the image.

Great video. Just kind of trails that I ride so I know the amount of bumps and bounce and the Osmo coped perhaps rather too well as you say! I have an Osmo mobile and have decided not to risk my iPhone on it on my bike but might look at a mod to add my GoPro.  Do you have any pictures of the mount that you used and thoughts?

A1000 Posted at 2017-1-16 06:34
Great video. Just kind of trails that I ride so I know the amount of bumps and bounce and the Osmo coped perhaps rather too well as you say! I have an Osmo mobile and have decided not to risk my iPhone on it on my bike but might look at a mod to add my GoPro.  Do you have any pictures of the mount that you used and thoughts?

Not being a rocket scientist I didn't employ rocket science to do the mounts. It was shot on the standard Osmo which uses the x3 camera.I didn't mount my android phone on the handle, half the time I used  the phone to aim the camera looking at its screen then would turn it off and put it in my back pocket, other half of the time I just guessed where the camera was pointing using the handle joystick. I definitely wouldn't suggest people use an Osmo mobile to do this - a few jolts and the phone will shake out of the holder.

So - 3 only mounts, then just pointed the camera in different directions to get the various shots. The day was hot as' so didn't spend much time composing shots.

1. Handlebar mount: this is using the DJI Handlebar mount. I have modified it slightly to work better by stretching it's internal spring out then compressing back onto the spring with a carefully tensioned cable tie.  There's posts and YouTube talking about it. It worked flawlessly.

2. Helmet mount: This is using the DJI sticky helmet mount and the DJI extension cable. (The sticky mount won't mount to a mtb/road-bike helmet because of the air vents stopping it having large enough surfaces to stick to. I had to file in grooves to the helmet mount and connect to the helmet with cable ties). I used just the gimbal mounted onto the extension cable/helmet-mount (to get the weight of the handle off my head). I mounted the other end of the extension cable to the Osmo handle, and mounted this on the DJI handlebar attachment, attached to my handlebars. I velcroed the extension cable along the top bar of my bike to stop it getting caught on branches.This allowed me to start/stop the camera as I was riding, plus allowed me to change angles remotely with the other rider just guessing it was pointing at him. This gave amazing stabilization: mountain bike dual suspension - my body - my neck/head - gimbal. As you see I hit overhanging branches a few times. I  didn't review footage between takes, we wanted to have fun riding, I was surprised when I saw my back pack bobbing into frame when I had the camera pointing backwards on my helmet. I ended up liking this as it really showed how hard and well the gimbal was working against the movement of my body.
3. Tyre-cam: gimbal/extension clamped onto seat post under seat with a small light attachment I had hanging around, and as above, ran extension cable up to handle mounted on handlebar. On the video you can see this when I'm shooting between my legs. The gimbal performed amazing taking out the up and down movement of the tyre and my leaning of the bike over on corners, the tyre is on suspension but the bike frame/camera still was jumping up and down. Compare the movement of the other rider as he mimicked my movement.

I can't work out how to link to a reply I did on this forum previously, but I have discussed in more detail my thoughts on how to get good bike footage, maybe you can search for my replies (?).
I recorded sound from the handle with the supplied little mic. The Osmo never missed a beat, The build quality on all of the components is very professional and solid. That being said it still is a hi-tech complex piece of miniature camera equipment, don't expect it to take knocks and drops, get a gopro if you need your camera to take punishment. I have never had a problem with sound, picture, sdcard recording, dropped communication with phone, or anything else. It blows my socks off what it can do. I've looked at the raw footage on a big UHD screen and stood there stunned at the quality and feeling it gave. Unfortunately the biggest problem in this era is how to get that quality onto the Web for the masses. I look at the fantastic quality of footage coming from mavic/phantom but then realise most of this is slow moving "compression friendly" footage, not fast action foliage which makes h264 etc fall apart on successive generations. This isn't a criticism of DJI, just an acknowledgement of the limits of current world technology.

Oglo Posted at 2017-1-16 21:00
Not being a rocket scientist I didn't employ rocket science to do the mounts. It was shot on the standard Osmo which uses the x3 camera.I didn't mount my android phone on the handle, half the time I used  the phone to aim the camera looking at its screen then would turn it off and put it in my back pocket, other half of the time I just guessed where the camera was pointing using the handle joystick. I definitely wouldn't suggest people use an Osmo mobile to do this - a few jolts and the phone will shake out of the holder.

So - 3 only mounts, then just pointed the camera in different directions to get the various shots. The day was hot as' so didn't spend much time composing shots.

Thanks for the comprehensive reply. In my opinion wrt action videos its a balance between quality of the footage with an 'in the moment' directorial style that really works and I think you nailed it.  I agree an osmo mobile isn't suitable! other that for some drive by shots.  I've tended to use Gopros for this kind of footage and not really worried about what is being captured as it detracts from the ride.

Where the GoPro ecosystem has real strength is in it's mounts and it might be worth looking at a hybrid of the two ecosystems to give more flexibility. Again well done on the footage.