There is  a lot of new gear coming in for the new year, as we look ahead to the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in Jan 2025, and fresh product slates from most of the brands. Will be posting as they come in, and get some real world look at them
It’s true, there were some incredible deals during Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and honestly still more on the way before years end. I hope you took advantage for gifts and end of year purchases.
Some great stuff in there!

Personally, I did pick up some extra batteries for my mirrorless, and handy mounts for camera and phone.

There was one solid purchase amidst all of the sale events.

The item I purchased wasn’t on sale, but that’s ok.  The DJI Pocket Osmo 3.

4K, portrait or landscape mode, all of the usual gimbals tracking choices, wireless connects to the DJI MIMO app to view or edit AND an incredible array of customization for picture and audio you will love.

Key Features

3-Axis Gimbal Stabilizer, 1″ CMOS Sensor,  Up to 4K120 Resolution, 2″ Rotatable Screen, Smart Horizontal/Vertical Shooting, D-Log M & 10-Bit Support, Active Track 6.0, Up to 166 Minutes of Battery Life, USB-C PD Cable Included, Wi-Fi & Bluetooth Support.

You can buy the unit alone, for about $520, and they offer a creator combo wth a lot of stuff you would be buying anyway, and you’ll save dough.  It is about $140 more. Highly recommend!

Here is what you get in the creator combo. The extra battery, microphone, and carrying bag made the most sense to me as an extra. The wide angle lens, which fits into the case, is not high on my list. you can see by the + sign what additional items you get.

I have added a few things, not in the creator combo that met some of my specific needs. Here is my personal list of additional things to get.

The DJI Osmo Pocket 3 is fast becoming my go-to camera for a variety of things:
On the street interviews:
A non obtrusive 4k video camera, with all the shooting bells and whistles I need, plus the ability to do a Blue Tooth connection to a phone for a larger monitor.
Speaking of the phone, which I prefer not to use in these situations. Why?
Have you ever had a video get interrupted by an incoming call or text?
I know, put it in airplane mode.
The Pocket 3 is a dedicated machine, designed to do what I need, multi format, and yes, have to send it to the phone app OR use a micro sd card reader to input it to your phone or an iPad for editing/upload.
And that’s not all.
Let’s talk about the DJI mic that connects automatically with the Pocket 3 when both are turned on. Plus a small tripod so you can sit it on a table.

It’s pretty great, and the mic has a 32 bit float, which will record the track to the mic itself as well as the Pocket 3. Comes with a fuzzy cat, can be clipped or mag attached. You can also plug in a lav mic if you’d like to be more discreet.
All sounding great right?
However, if you are just interviewing people on the street, maybe you don’t want to put the mic on someone you don’t know.
To solve this problem I added this $19 item that has a cold shoe, perfect for mounting a shotgun mic like a ShiftCam shotgun, which I like because it has a headphone jack on it so you can monitor the recording.
The mic needs a cable that goes from 3.5 TRS to TRRS, and then TRRS to USB-C to plug direct into the Pocket 3. The TRS to TRRS cable comes with the ShiftCam mic. The Apple connector you will need to add.

Here it is mounted: You can also add the extra battery if you’d like a longer handle.

That $19 expansion adapter also has the now classic 2 prong connector used by Go-Pro, so you can attach a ton of things to it, or grip it to another surface.

In the personal list above, I also added Apple in-ear  USB-C wired earphones to monitor recording when not using a shotgun mic like the ShiftCam. Great for private playback audio. You can actually record audio with them as well.

This camera is now in my bag at all times.

There was one other thing I wanted to do with this new workhorse.
How can I attach to my Rodecaster for podcasts so I use the Shure SM7B, have the sweet pre-amps, and also use the jingle pad for my pre-recorded music and sound effects?
I have the 1st version of the Rodecaster and have used it for over 120 podcasts, but 2025 will bring video with it, to enhance the podcast.
Could I attach traditional cameras and then sync everything in edit? Probably. I was looking for an easier solution. I’m a one man band.

After multiple calls with Rode, and hours at BH photo, I was told it couldn’t happen.

It Can!

This week I’ll post about the solution I found, and how it works. And it works like a champ!
Saved money, great video quality, excellent sound, and everything a tracking video gimbal all in one !.

As you can tell, I’m pretty happy with this purchase!  I also buy just about all of my photo/video gear from BH, because they stand by every product. During the holidays, they are allowing returns up to Feb!

True, I did get their credit card, PayBoo, as it saves me tax on every purchase. you should look into it.