Reviews |Insta360 ONE firmware update adds ‘gimbal killer’ stabilisation

Insta360 ONE firmware update adds ‘gimbal killer’ stabilisation

Insta360 ONE offers 6-axis stabilisation, raw capture, ’shoot first, point later’, priced $299
News

Insta360 has announced the addition of ‘groundbreaking stabilisation technology’ for the Insta360 ONE, along with new smart editing features, via a new firmware update.

Insta360 calls its new stabilisation technology FlowState stabilisation, which it claims produces smoother video than leading smartphones when mounted on to a gimbal. As evidence of this claim it produced this video:

The FlowState stabilisation requires no additional accessories to produce this stable video, Insta360 says.

The company says its FlowState stabilisation is so good that users can mount the ONE directly to vehicles, drones and selfie sticks and get stable videos.

Hyperlapses

Insta360 says the addition of FlowState and an upgrade to the companion app also makes it easier to create hyperlapse videos.

Users can now ‘run and gun’ the company says and have a 360 video as the raw material for their hyperlapse, allowing them to freely guide the viewer’s perspective in any direction as the camera moves through time and space.

New Editing Tools

The Insta360 ONE firmware update also introduces new editing tools for stitching together the best parts of 360 videos.

When editing a 360 video in the Insta360 ONE app, users will now have three choices of how to re-capture their key moments. Insta360 says:

New Pivot Points allow users to set points of interest throughout a video, giving an outline of the story they’d like to tell. Once set, the app automatically connects the points using ultra-smooth camera movements. It’s a fast, simple way to create professional-quality edits that would otherwise take hours on a desktop running specialized post-production software – not to mention multiple cameras covering different angles of a scene to begin with.

The newly improved SmartTrack lets a user select a key object or feature within the scene, then automatically holds it in center-frame throughout the video. The extra space for cropping offered by the 360° field of view, combined with proprietary FlowState stabilization, creates smooth tracking shots, all with a single tap.

ViewFinder mode gives total manual control. A user can maneuver their phone exactly as they would if they were recording an experience in real-time with their smartphone camera – turning from side to side, and adjusting zoom on the fly. Whatever they capture in their “re-shoot” will be saved as a new video. The possibilities are literally infinite.