I'm using HorizonBalancing, 4K60, and there are issues.

• The horizon is not being kept level.
• There are strange pans, noticable stabilization corrections, etc.
  

Here's my video example recorded from my Jeep today (it should be done processing soon):

Yet another action camera that can't do what it's advertised to do when filming action.

Yeah, something is not right as it is very east to see the lack of horizon balance.  

Has it just started doing this?  

Sideways G forces will affect it.  I mounted mine on the car roof, pointing sideways.  When I stopped at traffic lights or whatever, the gravitational effect on the sensor made the picture tip sideways somewhat, then it gradually corrected as I waited at the light.  It's normal.  Perhaps not desirable but I can see why it happens.  

fansfe82067d Posted at 4-4 13:12
Sideways G forces will affect it.  I mounted mine on the car roof, pointing sideways.  When I stopped at traffic lights or whatever, the gravitational effect on the sensor made the picture tip sideways somewhat, then it gradually corrected as I waited at the light.  It's normal.  Perhaps not desirable but I can see why it happens.

I didn't see that mentioned in the user manual, on the product page on their website, etc.

This is an action camera, purposefully built for action, such as cars, boats, motorcycles, race cars, planes, etc. It's supposed to be horizon leveling/balancing under action, not under slow benign movements.

It's the same with the Pocket range of cameras.  If you point one out of the window of a landing plane, the gimbal goes sideways under braking.  To maintain the horizon it has to sense gravity, or sense which way is down.  When G forces distort the gravitational pull on the camera, it's bound to confuse it.  In many action situations there isn't a prolonged sideways G force, it's more a matter of constant side to side movements, so the problem balances out.  I wonder whether the GoPro is any different in this respect?  I rather doubt it, but I don't actually know.

It seems to be affected by the cornering forces exerted when you make turns - a bit like FPV viewing.

fansfe82067d Posted at 4-4 21:58
It's the same with the Pocket range of cameras.  If you point one out of the window of a landing plane, the gimbal goes sideways under braking.  To maintain the horizon it has to sense gravity, or sense which way is down.  When G forces distort the gravitational pull on the camera, it's bound to confuse it.  In many action situations there isn't a prolonged sideways G force, it's more a matter of constant side to side movements, so the problem balances out.  I wonder whether the GoPro is any different in this respect?  I rather doubt it, but I don't actually know.

I have the GoPro 9 and 10 and they don't have this issue. They do however have other stabilization issues which is the reason I bought the Osmo Action 2.

You can see the phenomenon very well in this video, which I never published because it was something of a failed experiment, but notice the horizon balancing slowly recover each time the car stops.  At 1'59" it is quite extreme!

Yeah, that's another good example of the issue that you've posted. I hope they fix this with an update because it's one of the main reasons I bought the camera.

The rolling shutter is pretty bad in your example too.

Rolling shutter?  I'm not seeing that - if I pause at any point I'm not seeing any problem with verticals eg fences or poles.

You’re right. I think it’s just the extreme unleveled horizon that’s making it appear the way.

Here’s horizon leveling on my GoPro 10 for comparison:

have you tried dropping the resolution down to 2.7k 60fps and using horizon steady instead of horizon balancing?

fans3d974efb Posted at 4-6 22:35
have you tried dropping the resolution down to 2.7k 60fps and using horizon steady instead of horizon balancing?

I have not. Those settings don’t suite what I’m trying to achieve. FOV too cropped and 2.7k resolution isn’t sharp enough for me.

I opened a case with DJI and here was their response:

Dear Customer,

Thank you for contacting DJI Technical Support.
We appreciate your time in reaching us and letting us know about your question. It will be our pleasure to assist you with the right solution.

Thanks for the information and video

Upon checking, we recommend that you switch to HorizonSteady, which will conduct horizontal calibration for the view at each angle of inclination.
The horizontal viewing angle will be improved after calibration and hopefully this issue will be fixed.

If you have any further question, please feel free to contact us. We are always here to help.

Thank you for choosing DJI.

I wasn't sure if they meant put the camera into HorizonSteady for calibration and then switch back to HorizonBalancing. I hope so because recommending that a customer not use an advertised feature is not a solution. As it turns out, it doesn't matter because HorizonSteady doesn't keep the horizon level either.


Please allow some time for the videos below to process on YouTube.


Here's the results of recording 2.7k with HorizonSteady:


Here's the results of 4k 60p HorizonBalancing again after I recorded in 2.7k with HorizonSteady (for calibration) and then switched back to 4k 60p HorizonBalancing:


At this point either my camera is defective or DJI needs to acknowledge that there's an EIS issue and begin working on a fix. I'm gravitating towards there's an issue with EIS after seeing the others have the same issue in the videos posted above.

Would be interesting to see if the way horizonbalancing currently works makes the camera work as a gimbal when riding a motorcycle and leaning in corners.

I did have the same thought, but still would be an EIS issue. I could test on my ebike.

Here's the latest from DJI support:

Thank you for your reply and information.

I would like to personally apologize as I didn't get the chance to respond to your concern right away. We're truly sorry for the long wait. Rest assured that we are doing our best to get back to you as soon as possible.

We're sorry that this method did not solve your problem,
Yes, we're referring to HorizonSteady, not switch to HorizonSteady for a period of time and then back to HorizonBalancing.

In order to solve the problem as soon as possible
1. Please check if the DJI Action 2 firmware is the latest version. If not, update it to the latest one.
2. Please turn off the EIS function of the camera, and then check whether the horizontal angle can be restored.
3. Please place DJI Action 2 on a level surface, restore factory settings, and start HorizonSteady to check if the screen is level.

4.UI settings: Swipe down on the camera view on the touchscreen. Select System Settings - Horizon Calibration. Tap OK to confirm the calibration. It takes about 11 seconds.

Calibrate the internal IMU data of the main camera to ensure that after the stabilization mode such as horizon is turned on, the effect is stable and there will be no skew.

It is recommended to place the camera on a stable surface (as shown below). Do not shake the camera during calibration.

Please check whether the horizon calibration has been done successfully. If the horizon remains tilted after horizon calibration has been done successfully, please send us the camera log.
1. Go to camera unit System Settings - Device Info. Tap “Export Logs”.
2. Mount the camera unit and front touchscreen module/power module. Connect to DJI Action 2 and a computer using a USB-cable.
3. Select “File Transfer” on the DJI Action 2 screen. Go to “My Computer”. Find the corresponding disc for the DJI Action 2 (internal storage).4. Please export all log files and zip them. Send the entire zipfile back for analysis and confirmation.

DJI Mimo log files

1. iOS path: document/logs and /Documents/sdk； (zip and provide the entire file folder)

2. Android path: android/data/dji.mimo/files/LOG. (zip and provide the entire file folder)

It seems to me that they don't understand the issue. It's not that the Horizon is not level during rest, it's that it's not level while driving around curves in the road. I went through all of the steps above regardless. Same results as before as expected:

Please allow some time for the videos below to process on YouTube.

Here's the results of HerizonBalancing 4K60 after factory reset and Horizon Calibration:

Out of curiosity, why do you want to use HorizonBalancing/HorizonSteady with the camera mounted to a car?

fish sticks Posted at 4-17 22:13
Out of curiosity, why do you want to use HorizonBalancing/HorizonSteady with the camera mounted to a car?

I want to keep the horizon level.

Droogles Posted at 4-18 04:18
I want to keep the horizon level.

I thought you get this from the car being level.

Even if the camera is not perfectly aligned horizontally, you can adjust the angle after the video is taken. That will probably give you better image quality than in-camera rotation, because the camera has to use sensors to detect the angle, and it will have some inaccuracies. (even without the sideways acceleration issue you are reporting)

fish sticks Posted at 4-18 14:02
I thought you get this from the car being level.

Even if the camera is not perfectly aligned horizontally, you can adjust the angle after the video is taken. That will probably give you better image quality than in-camera rotation, because the camera has to use sensors to detect the angle, and it will have some inaccuracies. (even without the sideways acceleration issue you are reporting)

The horizon leveling is not working when the car drives around curves. It should keep the horizon level, hence its name. It should keep the horizon level under any condition that's not > 45 degrees per the specs.

If I don't use the horizon leveling, and just set the camera to Steady, ironically enough I get more of a level horizon, as long as the streets I'm driving are smooth and flat. So currently I make sure NOT to use HorizonBalancing or HorizonSteady if I want the horizon to be level. Ridiculous.

I'm not sure what you're referring to in your last paragraph about adjusting in post. For which recording mode? I don't use HorizonSteady because I lose resolution. 4K is a requirement. I record SlowTV, 1 hour+ drives. Leveling the horizon for a long drive would be an eternal nightmare.  

Here's a SlowTV recording from last weekend for example. If the camera could keep the hozizon level, the footage would be buttery smooth. This was shot with Steady mode:

Sorry about being unclear. I assumed that you want HorizonSteady/HorizonBalancing because the camera was not mounted flat (horizontally) on the car, but it seems that it is. I thought that the Horizon* modes compensate for "tilting" the camera left to right, which happens if you fly or take hand-held video, but not if the camera is fixed to a car as in your videos above.

fish sticks Posted at 4-19 00:31
Sorry about being unclear. I assumed that you want HorizonSteady/HorizonBalancing because the camera was not mounted flat (horizontally) on the car, but it seems that it is. I thought that the Horizon* modes compensate for "tilting" the camera left to right, which happens if you fly or take hand-held video, but not if the camera is fixed to a car as in your videos above.

A car mount is not leveled as all the roads have a slight tilt to evacuate water and with super wide angle lenses horizon tilted perspectives are much more noticeable as straight lines in the image periphery appear much more tilted than in the center due to the extreme distortion.
I've seen similar problems with action cams mounted in cars and it seems g-forces and specially in turns makes the stabilisation sensors fail perhaps because are tuned to expect a lower threshold, no f idea but the pattern is strong g-forces for sure.

In order to balance the horizon, the camera detects in which direction the centre of the earth lies.  Centrifugal forces will obviously skew that perception.  The system is not designed to accomplish a level horizon under such conditions.   To accomplish what you are requesting would require the horizon levelling system to work in a completely different way in order to operate successfully when lateral g forces are applied.  The same system is used in the DJI Pocket series of cameras, where the issue has been noted when shooting video from aircraft.  That redesign isn't now going to happen, and it probably wasn't implemented in the first place because the requirement is a minority use case (you seem to be the only person who has found this to be a significant problem so sorry, you're outnumbered).  I really don't see the point of discussing it further.

fansfe82067d Posted at 4-19 13:58
In order to balance the horizon, the camera detects in which direction the centre of the earth lies.  Centrifugal forces will obviously skew that perception.  The system is not designed to accomplish a level horizon under such conditions.   To accomplish what you are requesting would require the horizon levelling system to work in a completely different way in order to operate successfully when lateral g forces are applied.  The same system is used in the DJI Pocket series of cameras, where the issue has been noted when shooting video from aircraft.  That redesign isn't now going to happen, and it probably wasn't implemented in the first place because the requirement is a minority use case (you seem to be the only person who has found this to be a significant problem so sorry, you're outnumbered).  I really don't see the point of discussing it further.

Just because you state something as fact doesn't make it so. I find it unlikely that I'm the only one that has a use case of strapping a camera to a moving car, plane, race-car, motorcycle, jet ski, boat, rollercoaster, etc, who wants the horizon leveling feature to work under these conditions. Once again, it's an ACTION, not a benign movements, camera. The argument that the ACTION camera can only level the horizon during stationary interviews, carefully walking, slow panning, etc, is absurd. I might be the only one that kept the camera and posted here after being lied to. I've noticed how some people are very passive in the past couple decades, paying for a feature that they don't get and are alright with it.

There is a reason why I posted the GoPro 10 footage above, which doesn't have this issue.

Here's another example of how software can use the information coming from a camera to level the horizon. This is a GoPro 8 and reelsteady example I recorded:

Here's another video I recorded with the GoPro MAX. Horizon is level AF:

I returned the camera (amazon) for a refund due to support not being able provide a solution to the issue. They admit that the camera is not leveling the horizon and state that it should be, however they never tested it themselves and I got tired of waiting and going back and forth with them. In other words, a hardware replacement will not fix a software stabilization issue.

I will leave you with this warning. If you're expecting this camera to keep the horizon level while driving, on a motorcycle, in a boat, in a plane, anything that produces G forces on the camera, you probably will want to steer clear of this camera. Per my video posts above, you can see that the GoPro can keep the horizon level, even though it's an inferior camera IMO.

(DJI Support）

2022年5月4日 GMT+8 15:56

Hi David,

Thanks for your patience.

I would like to apologize for the troubles and frustration that you experienced during the process. The engineers have reviewed the case and confirmed that the DJI Action 2 is not reacting normally as you mentioned "While driving around curves, per my forum post and information I’ve shared, neither HorizonBalancing nor HorizonSteady level the horizon under my recording conditions".

We would create a replacement case and have your whole set of  DJI Action 2 shipped in and have a brand new DJI Action 2 shipped back via AIR shipping. If you are so kind to take the offer, please kindly provide your shipping info:

Name of sender:
Address with postal code:
Contact tel#: