Canon Vixia HF R800 + DJI Ronin SC - compatible gimbal solution!

danielrosehill — Wed, 04 Aug 2021 13:52:53 GMT

So perhaps I was just unlucky, but I had enormous difficulty finding a gimbal that would work with the Canon Vixia HF R800.

I wasn't looking for somethign that would work as in be compatible with the record feature on the gimbal. Just something that could fit onto a gimbal and be calibrated on it.

I'm based in Israel and tried just about every camera store I could find in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. I was repeatedly either told that there was no way that a camera of this shape could fit onto a gimbal or else that buying a gimbal would be ridiculous given that it was a budget cam and these things are built for DSLRs and mirrorless cams. It was a strange situation to be in. I couldn't find a camera store that would take my money.

I've just returned from a trip to the US to visit in-laws. As we were stopping through NYC on the way over, I decided - as a last ditch solution - to shoot B&H an email before I left to see whether they might know of a gimbal that could work with the camera. Lo and behold I got back an email pretty quickly affirming that the DJI Ronin SC should work just fine. This looked promising, I thought.

I decided to visit their showroom. They took my Vixia, put it on the demo Ronin SC and .... it just worked. Getting the thing calibrated was a bit of an effort but I'm slowing getting the hang of it.

There are a couple of videos on YouTube showing the Vixia HF R800 being used with a couple of Zhiyun gimbals. But as I found it so extremely hard to track down information (I searched everywhere online!) I thought I'd start this thread to share my experience. (The guy at B&H was also adamant that I should go with the Ronin over a Zhiyun although I didn't press him on why).

The Vixia HF R800 isn't fully compatible with the DJI Ronin SC to the extent that it can access the intended control functions. But with a bit of calibration, it can be fit onto it even though it seems a little small in relation to the gimbal itself. I have to hit the record button manually to start/stop glips with the Ronin mounted but ... I don't find it particularly bothersome to do so.

Hope this might help somebody who is also (like me until last month) searching for a solution.

(I bought the SC both because that's what B and H recommended to me and it fit my budget. I suspect that this camcorder would also fit onto the SC2 but I have no way of knowing that for sure).

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Canon Vixia HF R800 + DJI Ronin SC - compatible gimbal solution!