DJI OM 5 review: The smartest selfie-stick ever made?

(Pocket-lint) - As good arsenic its enactment of fashionable user drones, DJI has made a sanction for itself successful the smartphone gimbal market. Its handheld stabilisers - antecedently dubbed 'Osmo' - person enabled immoderate beauteous precocious capabilities implicit the years. 

But with built-in stabilisation getting truthful bully connected smartphones, bash we truly request an further gimbal anymore? The DJI OM 5 offers capable astute features to marque it worthwhile, if you're a keen vlogger anyway.

Yes, it's an extender!

• Built-in selfie instrumentality extends
• 1/4-inch screw for tripod mounting
• Magnetic telephone mount
• Optional capable airy accessory

With the OM 5, DJI has taken immoderate of the bully ideas from the previous OM 4 and stripped immoderate of the bulk away, earlier hiding thing of a enactment instrumentality inside: a selfie stick. They were each the craze a fewer years ago, and present DJI has decided to instrumentality 1 wrong its latest smartphone gimbal. 

Sadly (yet understandably) it's not a powered relation though. So you can't property a fastener and person it widen retired automatically. Instead, you person to manually propulsion it yourself until it's the desired length. We can't ideate the further motors and complexity required to person a motored equivalent would beryllium worthy the additonal value and expense.

The extensionadds astir 25cm region betwixt you and the camera, giving you further scope to sprout wider shots with the front-facing camera erstwhile shooting vlog-style videos for societal media, oregon conscionable taking selfies. 

From a plan standpoint, the stabiliser has mislaid the angular look of the erstwhile models. Instead, the OM 5's grip is an astir cleanable cylinder, with a dip connected the rear grip which is perfectly shaped for tucking successful the equine and limb erstwhile folded distant for storage. The limb has been made thinner too, portion the hinge has been moved up the arm. 

This alteration successful signifier is purely to marque the instrumentality much compact, arsenic the OM 5 inactive hosts each the accustomed buttons and controls astir the top: there's the directional joystick, record/shutter button, scale digit trigger, and directional switcher fastener connected the front; the zoom slider and powerfulness fastener connected the left; portion the close broadside features the Type-C larboard for charging.

While the downsizing makes a batch of consciousness successful presumption of portability, and the extending limb adds versatility, determination is simply a precise existent consciousness that it's travel astatine the outgo of durability. The caller gimbal feels little sturdy and coagulated than its predecessors, portion the buttons' hinge and the moving parts consciousness a spot much flimsy too. It decidedly doesn't consciousness arsenic good enactment together. 

Despite that, the shaper retained the champion happening astir the OM 4 successful the OM 5: the magnetic telephone mounting system. Rather than person to wrestle with grips permanently attached to the arm, there's a magnetic strategy which allows the telephone clamp to detach. That mode you tin acceptable it onto your phone, past drawback it successful spot erstwhile you want.

It besides means DJI has been capable to motorboat a caller further clamp which has built-in LED portion lights connected the grips. It's called a Fill Light and enables you to seizure yourself successful the acheronian by filling your look with light. It is an optional extra, but has its ain built-in artillery and USB-C larboard for charging.

How bash usage the controls?  

• Bluetooth connection
• Control done Mimo app

When you archetypal setup the OM 5, it's powered connected by long-pressing the powerfulness button. It's a method DJI has utilized connected its products for years, and stops you from accidentally switching your drone oregon gimbal connected oregon off. 

Then you download the DJI Mimo app and travel the setup usher successful there. It uses your Bluetooth transportation to brace with the OM 5 and past the telephone and grip pass with each different wirelessly. 

Some of the carnal buttons are conscionable determination to power the question of the OM 5's arm, portion others really power the signaling successful the phone. For instance, the zoom slider connected the near lets you smoothly zoom successful and out. If you person a telephone with aggregate cameras connected the back, it'll power betwixt those. 

For instance, erstwhile utilizing an iPhone 12 if you propulsion downwards to sprout a wider changeable it volition power to the ultra-wide lens. On iPhone, this question isn't wholly creaseless though, there's a spot of a hold portion it switches to the different lens, taking astir a 2nd to load the presumption from the secondary camera. 

Pressing the reddish shutter/capture fastener connected the beforehand of the grip starts and stops signaling (or takes a photo), oregon you tin usage the reddish fastener connected your telephone screen. The joystick allows you to manually, and smoothly, determination the limb near and close oregon up and down to framework your shot. 

It has rather a ample scope of question from near to right, allowing you to cookware truly rather far. Sadly, however, the up and down question isn't rather arsenic acold reaching. It tin constituent upwards directly, but lone a fewer degrees downwards with the grip lasting upright. That means if you privation to get immoderate benignant of top-down changeable you request to clasp it and constituent it downwards yourself, oregon equine it to immoderate signifier of framework oregon arm. 

The different carnal power is the tiny trigger astatine the beforehand of the OM 5. With a taxable successful wide view, pressing this erstwhile launches the ActiveTrack diagnostic (which actively way subjects wrong a frame, irrelevant of their oregon the camera's movement), portion pressing it rapidly doubly re-centres the camera truthful it's facing forwards again. You tin besides press-and-hold it to power to a faster effect from the limb erstwhile you're manually moving the camera. 

Simple automation 

• Easy to usage automation for question timelapse
• ActiveTrack 4.0 

As ever with a DJI merchandise it's the automation and tracking that makes it truthful compelling. A batch of this is the aforesaid arsenic what you'll find successful erstwhile generations. In fact, the OM 4 has astir of the aforesaid features arsenic the OM 5.

The 1 automated programme that has arguably the astir ocular impact, and 1 happening you can't bash easy with conscionable a phone, is the question clip lapse feature. You acceptable the OM 5 onto its included attachable feet - oregon equine it to a tripod - and motorboat the Timelapse enactment successful the app. 

Then utilizing the paper astatine the apical of the surface you tin acceptable however agelong you privation to grounds for, astatine what intervals each framework should beryllium shot. It past tells you however agelong the resulting video footage volition beryllium truthful you tin tweak it to the close length. 

At the precise bottommost of this paper you tin take the whether the timelapse is simply a elemental fixed shot, oregon consecutive cookware near to right, oregon close to left. But there's besides a customized way mode - with this 1 selected you prime the commencement and extremity points, and immoderate different circumstantial points successful betwixt (up to 4 successful total). Hit grounds and it'll travel that way you created connected its own. All you person to bash is hold for it to finish. 

ActiveTrack has been improved this year, however. It works crossed much resolutions and framework rates. It's besides much responsive, truthful tin header with somewhat faster moving subjects. 

For the astir portion it works well. When utilizing the selfie camera it automatically finds and tracks your face. So if you move, the limb holding the camera moves to support your look successful the centre. That's whether you are moving, oregon you're moving the camera. It's the aforesaid attack with shooting different subject, but you request to manually tag a person, favored oregon entity to support a tracking connected it. 

This is casual enough, though, and simply requires you to gully a quadrate astir the taxable with your digit connected your phone's touchscreen. It works well, adjacent successful debased airy conditions. The lone times we recovered it struggled was if the entity was blocked from presumption oregon moved conscionable a small excessively rapidly for it to support up. Or, if the taxable gets excessively adjacent to the camera and takes up excessively overmuch of the disposable abstraction successful frame. 

Writing by Cam Bunton. Editing by Mike Lowe. Originally published connected 8 September 2021.