Zhiyun Z1 Smooth-C Review - 3 Axis Gimbal For Mobiles

# Review: SmoothSee 3-Axis Gimbal for Smartphones – A Compact and Affordable Option

Last week, I reviewed the Zeon Crane, a high-end 3-axis gimbal designed for mirrorless cameras like my Sony A6300. Impressed by its stability and versatility, I decided to explore more options in the world of gimbals and purchased the SmoothSee, a budget-friendly 3-axis gimbal specifically designed for smartphones. Priced at $169 US, it’s one of the cheaper models available on the market. In this article, I’ll walk you through my experience with the SmoothSee, including its features, setup process, performance, and more.

## What’s in the Box?

The SmoothSee comes well-packaged, though it doesn’t include a hard case like the higher-end Zeon Crane model. Inside, you’ll find:

- **Warranty Card**: Standard documentation for product support.

- **Instruction Manual**: A basic guide to get you started with setup and usage.

- **Quick Start Guide**: A concise overview of essential functions.

- **Batteries**: Two 18350-sized batteries (3.7V, 900mAh). These are slightly unusual but widely available online.

- **Charger**: A small charger with a micro USB cable for easy charging using your phone’s charger.

- **Counterweight**: This is essential if you’re using a larger smartphone like an iPhone 6/7 Plus or Samsung Galaxy Note 5.

- **Gimbal Unit**: The main body of the SmoothSee, made from high-quality alloy and featuring a familiar joystick layout.

The gimbal itself is compact and lightweight, weighing just 396 grams without the phone. Its design ensures that the weight is distributed evenly, making it easy to handle for extended periods.

## Setup Process

Setting up the SmoothSee is straightforward. First, ensure the gimbal’s logo is facing you correctly—never flip it upside down as this could cause issues. Next, insert your smartphone into the holder. The holder is very tight, with minimal space for adjustments, which helps prevent the soft pad from blocking the phone’s microphone.

Once the phone is secure, turn on the power button (labeled “Power 1”) and hold the gimbal level to allow it to calibrate. The battery indicator LED will flash to show your remaining battery life, and you’re ready to start shooting.

## Modes of Operation

The SmoothSee offers three modes, accessible via the joystick:

1. **Locked Mode**: This mode keeps the phone facing a fixed direction. Rotating your wrist will slowly rotate the gimbal, allowing for smooth pans.

2. **Tilt/Pan Mode**: Tapping the joystick brings you to this mode, where you can tilt or pan the phone in any direction. The joystick sensitivity is consistent with the Zeon Crane model, though it’s worth noting that it can be overly sensitive at times.

3. **Adjustment Mode**: Double-tapping the joystick allows for fine-tuning the tilt to ensure your shots remain level.

## Build Quality and Design

The build quality of the SmoothSee is excellent. The gimbal is made from high-quality alloy, giving it a sturdy feel without adding unnecessary bulk. The design is reminiscent of its bigger sibling, the Zeon Crane, with the same joystick layout and intuitive controls.

One standout feature is the counterweight system. If you’re using a larger smartphone (e.g., Meizu Note 2 or Galaxy Note 5), you’ll need to screw on the provided counterweight to balance the device. This not only improves stability but also extends battery life by reducing motor strain.

The base of the gimbal features a standard tripod thread, allowing for additional mounting options. Whether you’re using it hand-held or mounted on a tripod, the SmoothSee delivers smooth, professional-grade footage.

## Battery Life and Portability

The batteries included with the SmoothSee are impressive, lasting several days of normal use. The charger is small and compatible with most phone chargers, making it easy to recharge on the go. The gimbal’s portability is a significant advantage—it’s much smaller than the Zeon Crane and can easily fit into your bag.

## Performance in Action

I took the SmoothSee out for a test drive around dinner, capturing some footage to assess its performance. Even with my front-facing camera lacking optical stabilization, the gimbal kept the phone incredibly steady. Walking shots were smooth, and only minor up-and-down movements hinted that I wasn’t using a dolly or skateboarding.

For someone like me, who isn’t a professional videographer, the results were impressive. The SmoothSee produces footage that looks professional, making it ideal for capturing moments with children or other active subjects.

## Pros and Cons

- **Pros**:

- Compact and lightweight design.

- Excellent build quality and durability.

- Includes necessary accessories like batteries and a counterweight.

- Affordable price point ($169 US).

- tripod compatibility for added stability.

- **Cons**:

- Joystick sensitivity can be overwhelming for beginners, with no option to adjust sensitivity settings.

- The holder is very tight, which might not suit all phone cases.

## Final Thoughts

Overall, the SmoothSee 3-axis gimbal is a solid choice for smartphone users looking for an affordable and portable stabilization tool. Its build quality, ease of setup, and impressive performance make it a great option for casual photographers and videographers. While it has some minor drawbacks, such as joystick sensitivity and limited customization, its price-to-performance ratio makes it a strong contender in the market.

If you’re in the market for a budget-friendly 3-axis gimbal and want to elevate your smartphone photography and videography, I highly recommend giving the SmoothSee a try. Thanks for reading, and don’t forget to subscribe to my channel for more reviews and updates!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enso last week I reviewed the zeon crane which is the 3 axis gimbal for mirrorless cameras like my sony a6300 which I'm currently shooting on I was that happy with the stability of it and just the things you could do with it that I decided to check out and get this right here which is this smooth see now this one here I picked up from a company called Tom top got it for a hundred and sixty nine us so it's one of the cheaper 3xs gimbals that you can get full of smartphones here and it's really just like the bigger model but it's smaller so more compact more lightweight and actually a lot easier to set up so show you what you get inside the box so it comes well packaged up but it doesn't have a hard case like you get with the mirror DSL version which is called the crane you see you get some warranty card instruction manual this instruction manual is just the basic outline of everything really we need to put the batteries in and a Quick Start Guide there it also shows you the battery indicator so the LED will flash they're telling you how much battery life you have left and the gimbal it comes with the two batteries now these batteries are odd ones but you can get this online they are 18350 3.7 volts and that's 900 million hours each of those includes a little charger here with a micro USB cable for charging that so you just need to use a charger that most people would have for your mobile phone just plug that in there so very easy to charge those batteries the other thing you get here is a counterweight now this counterweight is required if your mobile phone is bigger so it's something like a Apple iPhone 6 or 7 plus then you'll need this or a Galaxy Note 5 or something and here is the gimbal which is really well made and it actually doesn't weigh too much you see it has the same joystick setup that the larger crane version has in fact the same exact layout so the power1 button is right here there's the joystick status LED and this right here is used for four we're update scan it did it up via microUSB so all made out of alloy on the bottom here is where we insert the batteries and these batteries list for quite a long time I mean I've been using this for a couple of days now and I haven't actually needed to charge that up but it's also going to vary on you so if you're doing something with a lot of motion then those motors are going to have to work a lot harder and they will deplete the battery a bit quicker there so getting set up is really easy and quick so we need to just make sure you have the logo facing you the right way up because if I have this flipped around the other way which is possible that's not the right way up so you just got to make sure that that has the logo up the Z is always facing the correct way and then simply just insert it like this your mobile phone now this holder is very very tight bit of a gap there because otherwise the rubber pad the soft pad on the indent will block the microphone and once you have that in turn on the power and then hold down the button holding it level and then you'll see now it has come online and I'm able to move that around there you see with those movements and it's keeping my mobile phone level there which is really good so the modes we have just to cycle through them the first you get is this mode that and basically like a locked mode so it's always going to face in the same direction and you can rotate your wrist and it will slowly rotate around as well so you can do slow pans using that mode now tapping the joystick will bring up the other mode which gives us a left and right we can do left and right tilts sorry pans now just like the low division that I reviewed the joystick is the same and has the same sensitivity and it's the little tip here I found that if you put your other thumb on the other side to try and limit that motion then you can do those very slow steady pans there and if I go back now into that locked mode watch mode only allows you to tilt up and down your mobile and finally the third mode if you double tap allows you to adjust the tilt which is something I originally didn't see and I feel hang on it's not quite level the horizon so how do I correct that and it's just a double tap and then you can quickly tweak that and then get that level so real the build quality is really good so the weight of it without a mobile and there is 396 grams which I find is perfectly acceptable because of the way the weight is distributed on the whole gimbal and because it's made out of this really high-quality alloy the construction of that and build quality is really really nice and as mentioned there is that counterweight on there for larger mobile phones so for example here I have a me note 2 to 5.7 inch mobile this is heavier than my Samsung Galaxy s7 which doesn't require the counterweight but this mobile does and it's just a matter of fact of getting it and then just simply screwing that on the end of the arm giving it that counterweight oh so it's countering the work extra weight of that mobile there and I found that it works fine and using the counterweight on there will help improve their performance and stability of the gimbal it will also make sure that you're going to get the maximum battery life because those motors won't have to work as hard with the extra weight of a larger mobile now the base of the gimbal also has a standard typical tripod thread here so you're able to screw the gimbal onto other equipment so you can mount this on a tripod if you want extra stability use this on a tripod and then you can use the joystick and get some very smooth looking pan shots with it so once you have your mobile and they're the only real adjustment you need to do as it's just a once off ready if you're going to be using the same mobile that is is just to tweak this one here so adjusting the screw here again everything has told us just need to adjust that and in move the position Apple down of your mobile just to control the the angle of it to try and keep it a little bit level there but really I've just set on the middle setting there and that seems to work perfectly fine just to point out to that end the pack there's the soft sponge stick on that you put around this part here and what that does that's actually going to protect your mobile so when you turn off the gimbal when it's not powered we're gonna loosen just flop down it's to stop damaging your mobile so it will just go and hit that rubber there instead of actually crashing against the the alloy of the gimbal so I'm going to go out now and have a look around dinner with the gimbal and motion get some shots and we'll have a look at what kind of performance and stability we can get out of using the smooth C 3 axis gimbal here for smartphones walking along as you can see at the moment and you can just see how rock-solid this is because the front-facing camera doesn't have any optical stabilization on this mobile so you can see from that footage that I recorded and I'm just a novice when it comes to cameras I am NOT a professional you can get some some nice footage out of it now my only real complaint about this gimbal here the smooth see is the joystick just like the larger version the crane I find that it's overly sensitive and it does take a lot to get used to without accidentally having your pan just too quick I wish there was like a dial on there that you could set joystick seven sensitivity you could just tweak that right down and if you needed it faster for sports events or something then you could just tweak it up again so if they had that option on there or maybe just software a way to connect up and dial that down that would be really good now the build quality is excellent the battery seems to at least with my use now it seems to be lasting for quite some time and the charger is tiny so it's going to be easy enough to be able to charge that using your mobile phone charger so that is good and the portability of it because it's a lot smaller than the larger crane version which is for mirrorless DSLR cameras this thing here is so easy just to slip in a bag and the setup is literally only 10 seconds put my mobile in there it's still with the same position from before and away I go turn it on power it out and it's working fine and you see there that's the the stability it offers especially when you're walking the only thing that gives it away that the shot is walking and you're not being pulled along on some sort of dolly or you're standing on a skateboard or riding a bike is the fact that you're moving up and down that's the only thing and if your mobile phone has really good stability anyway digital or optical then that's even going to help out further with creating some really nice professional-looking steady footage which is going to be great for people with smaller children they can follow them around when they're playing and just have better looking footage overall in general this gimbal and I find that the price of about 169 us that's actually not too bad considering what you are getting here because there's a lot of other options out there there are a lot more expensive thanks so much for watching this review and hopefully I will catch you back in the channel soon if you haven't already want to think about subscribing to the channel tooso last week I reviewed the zeon crane which is the 3 axis gimbal for mirrorless cameras like my sony a6300 which I'm currently shooting on I was that happy with the stability of it and just the things you could do with it that I decided to check out and get this right here which is this smooth see now this one here I picked up from a company called Tom top got it for a hundred and sixty nine us so it's one of the cheaper 3xs gimbals that you can get full of smartphones here and it's really just like the bigger model but it's smaller so more compact more lightweight and actually a lot easier to set up so show you what you get inside the box so it comes well packaged up but it doesn't have a hard case like you get with the mirror DSL version which is called the crane you see you get some warranty card instruction manual this instruction manual is just the basic outline of everything really we need to put the batteries in and a Quick Start Guide there it also shows you the battery indicator so the LED will flash they're telling you how much battery life you have left and the gimbal it comes with the two batteries now these batteries are odd ones but you can get this online they are 18350 3.7 volts and that's 900 million hours each of those includes a little charger here with a micro USB cable for charging that so you just need to use a charger that most people would have for your mobile phone just plug that in there so very easy to charge those batteries the other thing you get here is a counterweight now this counterweight is required if your mobile phone is bigger so it's something like a Apple iPhone 6 or 7 plus then you'll need this or a Galaxy Note 5 or something and here is the gimbal which is really well made and it actually doesn't weigh too much you see it has the same joystick setup that the larger crane version has in fact the same exact layout so the power1 button is right here there's the joystick status LED and this right here is used for four we're update scan it did it up via microUSB so all made out of alloy on the bottom here is where we insert the batteries and these batteries list for quite a long time I mean I've been using this for a couple of days now and I haven't actually needed to charge that up but it's also going to vary on you so if you're doing something with a lot of motion then those motors are going to have to work a lot harder and they will deplete the battery a bit quicker there so getting set up is really easy and quick so we need to just make sure you have the logo facing you the right way up because if I have this flipped around the other way which is possible that's not the right way up so you just got to make sure that that has the logo up the Z is always facing the correct way and then simply just insert it like this your mobile phone now this holder is very very tight bit of a gap there because otherwise the rubber pad the soft pad on the indent will block the microphone and once you have that in turn on the power and then hold down the button holding it level and then you'll see now it has come online and I'm able to move that around there you see with those movements and it's keeping my mobile phone level there which is really good so the modes we have just to cycle through them the first you get is this mode that and basically like a locked mode so it's always going to face in the same direction and you can rotate your wrist and it will slowly rotate around as well so you can do slow pans using that mode now tapping the joystick will bring up the other mode which gives us a left and right we can do left and right tilts sorry pans now just like the low division that I reviewed the joystick is the same and has the same sensitivity and it's the little tip here I found that if you put your other thumb on the other side to try and limit that motion then you can do those very slow steady pans there and if I go back now into that locked mode watch mode only allows you to tilt up and down your mobile and finally the third mode if you double tap allows you to adjust the tilt which is something I originally didn't see and I feel hang on it's not quite level the horizon so how do I correct that and it's just a double tap and then you can quickly tweak that and then get that level so real the build quality is really good so the weight of it without a mobile and there is 396 grams which I find is perfectly acceptable because of the way the weight is distributed on the whole gimbal and because it's made out of this really high-quality alloy the construction of that and build quality is really really nice and as mentioned there is that counterweight on there for larger mobile phones so for example here I have a me note 2 to 5.7 inch mobile this is heavier than my Samsung Galaxy s7 which doesn't require the counterweight but this mobile does and it's just a matter of fact of getting it and then just simply screwing that on the end of the arm giving it that counterweight oh so it's countering the work extra weight of that mobile there and I found that it works fine and using the counterweight on there will help improve their performance and stability of the gimbal it will also make sure that you're going to get the maximum battery life because those motors won't have to work as hard with the extra weight of a larger mobile now the base of the gimbal also has a standard typical tripod thread here so you're able to screw the gimbal onto other equipment so you can mount this on a tripod if you want extra stability use this on a tripod and then you can use the joystick and get some very smooth looking pan shots with it so once you have your mobile and they're the only real adjustment you need to do as it's just a once off ready if you're going to be using the same mobile that is is just to tweak this one here so adjusting the screw here again everything has told us just need to adjust that and in move the position Apple down of your mobile just to control the the angle of it to try and keep it a little bit level there but really I've just set on the middle setting there and that seems to work perfectly fine just to point out to that end the pack there's the soft sponge stick on that you put around this part here and what that does that's actually going to protect your mobile so when you turn off the gimbal when it's not powered we're gonna loosen just flop down it's to stop damaging your mobile so it will just go and hit that rubber there instead of actually crashing against the the alloy of the gimbal so I'm going to go out now and have a look around dinner with the gimbal and motion get some shots and we'll have a look at what kind of performance and stability we can get out of using the smooth C 3 axis gimbal here for smartphones walking along as you can see at the moment and you can just see how rock-solid this is because the front-facing camera doesn't have any optical stabilization on this mobile so you can see from that footage that I recorded and I'm just a novice when it comes to cameras I am NOT a professional you can get some some nice footage out of it now my only real complaint about this gimbal here the smooth see is the joystick just like the larger version the crane I find that it's overly sensitive and it does take a lot to get used to without accidentally having your pan just too quick I wish there was like a dial on there that you could set joystick seven sensitivity you could just tweak that right down and if you needed it faster for sports events or something then you could just tweak it up again so if they had that option on there or maybe just software a way to connect up and dial that down that would be really good now the build quality is excellent the battery seems to at least with my use now it seems to be lasting for quite some time and the charger is tiny so it's going to be easy enough to be able to charge that using your mobile phone charger so that is good and the portability of it because it's a lot smaller than the larger crane version which is for mirrorless DSLR cameras this thing here is so easy just to slip in a bag and the setup is literally only 10 seconds put my mobile in there it's still with the same position from before and away I go turn it on power it out and it's working fine and you see there that's the the stability it offers especially when you're walking the only thing that gives it away that the shot is walking and you're not being pulled along on some sort of dolly or you're standing on a skateboard or riding a bike is the fact that you're moving up and down that's the only thing and if your mobile phone has really good stability anyway digital or optical then that's even going to help out further with creating some really nice professional-looking steady footage which is going to be great for people with smaller children they can follow them around when they're playing and just have better looking footage overall in general this gimbal and I find that the price of about 169 us that's actually not too bad considering what you are getting here because there's a lot of other options out there there are a lot more expensive thanks so much for watching this review and hopefully I will catch you back in the channel soon if you haven't already want to think about subscribing to the channel too\n"