Blackmagic Forum

Just a general question as I've been impressed with the stabilization of the GoPro Hero6. My understanding is it uses the sensors in the gopro to enhance the stabilization being done, but I'm still not sure why resolve (or another post-processor) couldn't do a better job 100% of the time?

If I turned stabilization OFF, shouldn't the added benefit of more processing power and ability to analyze the clip it it's entirety be grounds for producing better results? On the other hand, is the gopro actively smoothing things out as filming is happening, whereas without their stabilization the jumps would just be too jerky?

Just trying to better understand the mechanics/intelligence behind it to better understand if I should pre-stabilize or post-stabilize, if the footage is going through resolve regardless.

It's like you said, the GoPro has a bunch of very precise sensor data that is calibrated for that model of camera. So it can tie every movement to a specific frame of footage and make the appropriate compensations based on what the camera actually experiences. Whereas Resolve (and other NLEs) can only compare pixels and guess, "Is this pixel changing because of camera movement or natural movement in the scene?"

When you think about it, stabilizing in post is kind of miraculous in its own way.

The only two ways I can see post-processing being competitive is for cameras to publish the stabilization metadata, and having NLEs that can use that data. Or using AI to better interpret the footage without additional metadata.