DJI RS2 vs RSC2: Which One Is Right For You?

These gimbals could be two of the best prosumer gimbals on the market, everyone’s been talking about them, it’s the DJI RS2 and RSC2. There are differences between them, so which one is right for you?

First off, the difference is, of course, the RS2 is the flagship; it’s double the price and it has a little bit more of that flashy design element. The arms are made of carbon fibre so it’s going to be lighter than the RSC2, and it can also handle a heavier payload, up to 10 pounds or about 4.5kg versus 6.6 pounds or 3kg. So if you’re in the mirrorless world with a Sony A7 camera, an A6000 series or a Fujifilm camera like the XS10, the RSC2 will be more than enough for you. If you’re using something like the Panasonic S1H, or if you want to put a mic system on this or a larger lens or even a Canon 1DX or C series camera, the RS2 will be where you want to be just for safety, and because of the payload options on it.

The RS2 is slightly lighter than the RSC2, only slightly, to be honest with you. You probably won’t notice it day to day if you have both of them. Reason being, of course, the carbon fibre. Another difference here is that the battery can be taken out of the RS2, while the battery is internal on the RSC2. Let’s talk about some of the differences here in terms of adjustability, because that’s what has always been a pain point with gimbals. If you’re new to gimbals and you found them intimidating, the RS2 makes it a lot easier. Case in point, there is an adjustment dial that really makes fine-tuning the adjustment when you first set up with a camera very easy. If you’re only going to use one camera and lens on the gimbal, you set it up once and you don’t have to worry about it ever again.

With the RSC2 you don’t have that adjustment knob, you have lock knobs, but if you have a very light camera, you’ll find that you’ll be able to set this up in a couple of minutes. You can do it through a phone and the DJI app but you can also pretty much do everything through the gimbal, you don’t have to rely on the phone. With the RS2 you have a 1.4-inch touchscreen display. Previously on gimbals, we always have to remember what buttons did what, and if you forgot, you had to rely on your smartphone or look at the instruction manual.

DJI has simplified this in a way with this touchscreen display that does make it a lot easier. One thing to take note of is that this touchscreen display is quite sensitive, so if you do not want to tap something on accident, just press the power button once to lock it. That way you won’t accidentally swipe on or activate something you didn’t want it to.

With the RSC2, you do have a smaller display but it’s not touch screen. It requires a wheel and a button to activate and adjust your settings, but these gimbals have pretty much the same settings. You have your pan and follow, your pan tilt follow modes, you have your 360-degree mode if you want to do that spin motion. You have your portrait mode so you can do all these in both of these gimbals.

Another feature to these gimbals, which is a very welcomed addition especially if you want really smooth shots, is Super Smooth. This new algorithm really smoothens out your shots and you’re going to notice a difference from the previous Ronin gimbals out there. You do need to have a lens mount attached to this and you have to calibrate it, after that, you’re going to notice your shots are a lot smoother.

The RSC2 can also fold up, so if you’re someone that carries a very small bag, you can fold it up and pack in a bag or you can adjust it to be in underslung mode or various different modes that you have, just by this arm system. It’s a genius move by DJI.

For a lot of people out there, the RSC2 will be the gimbal for you if you’re not into professional cinematography and you’ve got a small camera set up, or maybe you’re a one-man operation, then this will be the system that a lot of you will like. The battery in this is built-in, you can’t take it out like you can on the RS2, but it is quick charging like the RS2, so you get about 12 hours battery usage on both of these.

Considering that the RSC2 is around US$500 and the RS2 is around US$1,000, there’s going to be some trade-offs. If you want all the bells and whistles, if you are a professional, if you have a larger camera setup or if you’re changing from various different cameras, you should definitely go with the RS2 just for that flexibility and just for that ease of mind that your camera system will fit on this.

Something else that’s new to the DJI system here on the RS2 and the RSC2 is RavenEye. This is a very welcome addition, it allows you to stream the content that’s coming out of your camera to your smartphone, your tablet or whatever device you’re going to be using with it that can pair with the DJI app. It’s nice in the sense that if you ever want to use Active Track, previously you’d have to put your phone on top of your camera through a hot shoe mount, and then you can use Active Track based on the same distance and it was really messy and you really couldn’t use the gimbal.

But with RavenEye attached underneath, you don’t need to worry about your smartphone anymore. You could have it attached on the side of the gimbal, you could have somebody else use the phone to control the gimbal via RavenEye through the wireless transmission and they’ve got full control of the gimbal and the camera system. Of course, it’s dependent on whether your camera is compatible with RavenEye or the DJI system, so do check that, but we would say most of the more popular cameras out there are compatible.

If you’re the kind of videographer who’s shooting professionally with different camera setups and you need something that’s going to handle that weight but you also want flexibility, then, of course, you can invest in the RS2. But thinking logically, the RSC2 is the gimbal that’s good enough for a lot of casual videographers out there.

---

Content by Bobby Tonelli