Integrated gimbal video recording devices have emerged to become an even more important camera category than the traditional “action cameras” which preceded them.  Not everyone is snow boarding or skydiving and needs a rugged device to provide a POV perspective on the action.  I would argue that the larger market is for a device that just removes all the friction from capturing lifestyle video and vlog type content.  A GoPro for example, has never been a great device for vlogging.

WHAT ABOUT USING A SMART PHONE?

As an iPhone 17 Pro owner, I’m keenly aware of the benefits of using my iPhone to capture walk around video or vlog content.  The quality of the video is superb, as it would be with most any high-end mobile phone.  The problem with using a mobile phone isn’t the video quality – it’s the friction.  Particularly when I travel – that’s when I want reduced friction, not more.  Using a phone for high-quality video capture creates significant battery drain as well as additional storage need.  You can mitigate these problems with additional accessories – additional batteries, external storage, etc.  How do you incorporate these accessories quickly and easily onto your phone when you want to record video?  Realistically, you’re probably talking about some sort of a cage or maybe a phone gimbal.  But rigging out a phone with external batteries, storage, and external audio?  That’s a tremendous amount of friction.  I learned long ago I prefer using a separate device for video capture.

DJI essentially created this category of camera. Less friction than a smartphone and better video quality than a traditional action camera. However, DJI’s relationship with the U.S. government has become increasingly complicated, and some of their newest products are difficult or impossible to obtain through normal U.S. retail channels. As a result, many American creators are now looking for alternatives.  Enter the Insta360 Luna Ultra. While the DJI Pocket 3 remains widely available(which I own and have previously reviewed), the newer DJI Pocket 4P is not.  So I decided it was time to try my first Insta360 product and see if the Luna Ultra could earn a place in my camera bag.  Note:  This is review is not sponsored.  I ordered the Luna Ultra with my own hard-earned cash.  Did I keep it?  Keep reading.

The main selling point of this generation of integrated gimbal video devices is the addition of a second lens.  Like the Pocket 4P, the Luna Ultra has two separate lenses – 20mm and 60mm.The 20mm lens is paired with a 1-inch sensor while the 60mm lens is paired with a 1/1.3-inch sensor.  So you’ve essentially got two separate cameras that share a gimbal.

This is very much a welcome addition to the category – 20mm is great for handheld vlogging and capturing expansive scenes, but in many cases, more zoom is needed.  The photographers out there will recognize that 60mm is a bit more than the classic 50mm focal length which.  Many photographers prefer shooting with 50mm to the point that they shoot with nothing else.  In my experience using the Luna Ultra, I found the 60mm lens to be a fanatically useful tool.  Now you can, for example, set up the Luna Ultra on a tripod and use the 60mm lens for talking head type content in an entirely different way – achieving much more background and subject separation.  It also has near macro close up capability.  Between the additional options for video, as well as taking photos with these two lenses, you may now be able to legitimately consider leaving additional camera at home when you want to travel light, and capture all your photos and videos from this single device.

ZOOM ZOOM

Because the Luna Ultra’s primary camera records in 8K, Insta360 can crop into the image while still maintaining a full 4K output. The company refers to this as “lossless” zoom, and in practical terms it allows you to reach an effective focal length of roughly 120mm while maintaining 4K image quality.

Starting with the 20mm lens, a 2x crop gives you a field of view roughly equivalent to 40mm.  Zoom in further and the camera switches over to the dedicated 60mm telephoto lens.  Because that lens also has 8K of resolution to work with, you can crop in another 2x and achieve an effective focal length of approximately 120mm while still recording in 4K.

Beyond that point, the Luna Ultra relies on digital zoom.  Insta360 advertises up to a 240mm equivalent field of view, though image quality begins to decline as you move beyond the 120mm range.

Personally, I suspect I’ll spend 90% of my time shooting with the native 20mm and 60mm lenses for maximum image quality.  That said, having a usable 120mm equivalent option available at the touch of a button could prove valuable for more cinematic compositions, tighter framing, or isolating distant subjects.

Will I ever zoom all the way to 240mm?  Lord, I hope not… but options are nice.

One thing worth noting is that while you can smoothly zoom from 20mm all the way to 120mm using the zoom rocker, the transition isn’t completely seamless.  There is a noticeable hand-off when the camera switches from the 20mm lens to the dedicated 60mm telephoto lens.  If you’re trying to create a perfectly smooth zoom effect, it’s best to start with the 60mm lens and zoom from there.

STAND OUT FEATURE – THE REMOTE

The Insta360 Luna Ultra has a truly unique standout feature not currently offered by any competing product. The entire front face of the Luna Ultra is detachable and functions not only as a wireless remote control, but also as a wireless microphone. Once detached, you can perform virtually every function available on the camera directly from the remote. It’s an incredibly powerful capability that fundamentally changes how you interact with the device.

Like most cameras in this category, Insta360 also offers a free companion app that provides remote control functionality and live-view monitoring. There are certainly situations where the app will be the better choice.  The detachable remote features a two-inch display, while most modern smartphones offer significantly larger screens with higher resolution and, in many cases, greater brightness.  The Luna Ultra’s display is rated at an impressive 1000 nits, but there are still situations where a larger phone display can make framing and monitoring easier.  Having used both methods extensively, however, I found myself reaching for the detachable remote far more often than I expected. The reason comes down to one simple concept:  friction.

Using the app requires pulling out your phone, launching the application, connecting to the camera, and then navigating virtual controls on a touchscreen. None of those steps are particularly difficult, but they take time. With the detachable remote, I simply unclip it and start recording. The connection is immediate, the controls are physical, and the entire experience feels more natural and responsive.  It does however have a relatively small battery – expect a run time of our about 1 hour when the remote is separated.  It begins recharging immediately when re-attached to the main unit.

That difference may sound minor on paper, but in practice it’s one of the Luna Ultra’s most compelling features. When you’re traveling, walking through a city, recording yourself, or simply trying to capture a moment before it disappears, reducing friction matters. The detachable remote makes the Luna Ultra feel less like a camera connected to an ecosystem and more like a self-contained production tool.

The microphone built into the detachable remote is surprisingly good. In my testing, it delivered excellent results when used handheld and positioned reasonably close to the speaker’s mouth. In fact, I would have no hesitation using it as the primary audio source for a YouTube video.

Perhaps more importantly, achieving good results requires very little effort. The audio coming straight out of the camera is full, clear, and easy to understand, with a noticeably more polished, broadcast-style sound than I expected. While experienced creators may still choose to apply EQ, compression, or other post-processing, most users will be perfectly happy with the audio quality they get straight out of the camera.

INTEGRATED MIC AUDIO IS NO JOKE

Perhaps the biggest shock I got was listening to the playback of the audio I recorded using the integrated microphones on the Luna Ultra.  This is the first device I’ve ever tested where I felt like the audio track produced by the device’s integrated microphones were perfectly usable straight out of the camera.  No sophisticated “audio engineering” required in post.  Whether you’re solo vlogging or doing more of a two person conversation/interview, the Luna Ultra integrated microphones have several different modes which can be optimized for your use case.

Insta360 Mic Pro

For creators looking for even more pro-level audio solutions, Insta360 released their Mic Pro alongside the Luna Ultra.  One of the Mic Pro units comes with the Creator Bundle, or it can be purchased separately.  I could probably name at least a dozen different competing wireless mic options on the market right now, but Insta360 brings a couple of genuinely unique features to the Mic Pro.  Firstly, while most wireless mics are designed to easily concealable, The Mic Pro features a customizable E-ink display which allows the user to upload images or logos through the Insta360 app – a very attractive capability for professional users and content creators interested in branding.  The Mic Pro also features 3 built-in microphones (32-bit float!) that combined with intelligent algorithms, enable directional pickup to help adapt to any environment.   I’ll be doing a separate article and video on the Insta360 Mic Pro, but the quality is impressive and is easily the lowest friction option for using a wireless mic with the Insta360 Luna Ultra.

My biggest concern with the Mic Pro isn’t audio quality—it’s the attachment mechanism.  The clip itself attaches securely to clothing, but the microphone slides onto the clip from above.  In my testing, it appears that upward pressure could potentially separate the microphone from the clip.  I haven’t actually had the microphone fall off during use, but the design inspires less confidence than some competing systems.  The Mic Pro also comes with a fairly strong magnetic attachment that might be preferred in some respects to the plastic clip attachment.

INTERNAL STORAGE

The Insta360 Luna Ultra has 47gb of internal storage.  That may be enough for many casual users to be able to do the recording they want without having to purchase an additional microSD card – which like all types of memory right now is prohibitively expensive due to the hardware demands of the AI revolution we find ourselves in today.  in my opinion, using microSD cards will still be preferable because I found the workflow of transferring footage directly from the device to my computer to be a little clunky, and the transfer speed was painfully slow.  Of course, I’m spoiled by the ProGrade Digital Gold Class V3 MicroSD cards I use.  But as a backup solution for when you inevitably leave your microSD card back on your desk at home?  That’s where the internal storage will save your bacon.

THE LEICA LOOK?

Insta360 markets the Luna Ultra as being “co-engineered with Leica.”  Personally, I think there’s a couple of reasons Insta360 chose to partner with Leica.  While Insta360 is a ten+ year old company, the Luna Ultra is an entirely new product segment for Insta360.  They want to compete with DJI’s arguably 5thgeneration product (if you count the original Osmo that pre-dated the Osmo Pocket) with their own 1st generation product.  So the development partnership with Leica helps to a degree alleviate concerns for buyers that might be included to wait for the inevitable Luna Ultra 2.  Also, Leica is a more well-established brand than Insta360 – particularly for higher-end products.  The halo effect from the brand association is obvious.

Let’s first take a look at the two “Leica Summicron” lenses on the camera – the 20mm lens with a f1.8 aperture, and the 60mm lens with a f2.   The main benefit for me to the 60mm lens is that it will add reach without relying on digital cropping as well as additional background compression and natural bokeh than can be achieved with a 20mm lens.  That will allow me to use the Luna Ultra for product video in ways I never could with the Pocket 3.

Leica also contributed color profiles to the Luna Ultra – they’re essentially filters.  Will I use them in my videos?  No.  But I a more intermediate to advanced user – I’ll likely shoot most of my footage in I-Log or the very nice looking Standard Profile.  Personally, I think the filters might have more applicability when used with photos taken with the Luna Ultra – the “Leica Look” is after all primarily associated with photography, not videography.  But here again choices are good – more casual users who have no desire to grade log footage may like use the Leica filters.  Go for it – not my jam.

I’ll comment more about lens characteristics like flare resistance, contrast, and consistency between the 20mm and 60mm below which I discuss image quality.  But in terms of Leica’s contribution to the Luna Ultra, I want to make clear that while some buyers may appreciate the novelty of and even find benefit from the “Leica Look” filters, don’t expect the Luna Ultra to faithfully reproduce results seen from a true Leica camera.

10-BIT I-LOG

Aside from the telephoto lens, the other big attractive feature of the Luna Ultra is the ability to record in true 10-bit Log format called I-Log.  My Pocket 3 can record in DJI’s D-Log M, a flattened gamma profile designed to preserve highlight and shadow detail while remaining easy to grade. While D-Log M provides more flexibility than a standard video profile, it generally offers less grading latitude than a true logarithmic recording format.  The advantage I always found with using D-Log M is that DJI has a fantastic Rec.709 LUT that can be downloaded on their Pocket 3 Support Page can be slapped on their Pocket 3 D-Log M footage for nearly perfect and instant graded footage.   Fortunately Insta360 has similar LUTs that can be downloaded here.

I recorded the majority of my YouTube review video below using I-Log an found it to be easy to grade for an experienced user (I use Final Cut Pro plus Cinema Grade Pro for color grading) but I-Log will clearly be for a more serious and demanding user.  But by the same token, using the Insta360 Luna Ultra Rec.709 LUT is both easy and fast, and looks better than the standard non-I-Log footage. Unless you don’t have access to a video editor that supports LUTs, there’s almost no reason not to record every Luna Ultra video in I-Log. I shot most of my footage for my review video in I-Log, and in most cases applying Insta360’s Rev.709 LUT was all that was needed to produce portable footage which had a higher quality, more cinematic look and feel than the results from shooting in the Luna Ultra’s Standard Profile.  That said, there will be times while using this device that I won’t want to take the time and go to the effort of grading the footage – and the Standard Profile produced surprisingly good results.

BRINGING LIGHT TO THE DARKNESS

Many portable video recording devices can produce excellent results in brightly lit, daytime conditions.  But when the light goes out, invariably those small sensors fall apart.  To meet this challenge, Insta360 has designed powerful AI image processing capabilities into the Luna Ultra and has a “PureVideo” mode for recording in low-light.  In my mind, PureVideo mode is the low-light (even near dark conditions) to the Standard Profile mode on the Luna Ultra in bright light in that both can produce fantastically useable footage straight out of the camera with no editing required.  But for top quality, professional results graded I-Log footage looks better.  But casual users will be thrilled with what PureVideo mode can produce.

BATTERY LIFE: PROS AND CONS

The internal battery of the Insta360 Luna Ultra is manufacturer rated for four hours – impressive, but likely optimistic depending on a number of different use factors.  But the Luna Ultra supports fast charging- which means you can restore about 80% of the batteries operating capacity with just 24 minutes of charge time.  That means you can record for 3 to 4 hours in the morning, put the Luna Ultra on a charger while you break for lunch, and record for another 2 to 3 hours.  This is significant for a lot of people as it means they might not have to buy the accessory battery which only adds about one hour of run time.  And even if they have it, depending on the situation, they may not need to bring it.

The flip side of this is you really have to consider how you’re going to use the Luna Ultra when you think about battery life and runtime – Particularly where the remote is concerned.  The remote has its own internal rechargeable battery and it’s quite small which means that it will run out of power well before the camera has itself does – you only get about an hour of battery life on the remote.

WHO IS THE INSTA360 LUNA ULTRA FOR?

The Luna Ultra has an interesting mix of features that will appeal to novices, intermediate content creators, and professional users alike.  If a novice wants to just pick up the Luna Ulta and press “record” they can – the unprocessed footage looks really good.  If they want to get a little fancier and apply a Leica Look in camera for a bit of a cinematic look, that’s easy too for beginners.  Intermediate and more professional users will appreciate the flexibility of being able to shoot in 10-bit I-Log to achieve a more professional or custom look.  The price of the Luna Ultra will, I think, tend to skew potential buyers away from novices and even intermediate content creators and toward more affluent and professional buyers.  The retail price of the Insta360 Luna Ultra is $770.00 for the standard model, and $970.00 for the creator bundle.   US buyers still have access to the remarkably good DJI Pocket 3 (which you may remember also sports a 1” sensor) which can be had for just $419.00 as of this writing.  Look for a comparison of these two camera coming soon.

In my personal opinion, the Insta360 Luna Ultra is primarily for the solo content creator – someone like me.  The tracking capabilities are amazing, and even if you don’t use the Insta360 Mic Pro, you have several different modes and options for producing professional sounding audio.  Conversely, a more casual user who is not price sensitive will love what the Luna Ultra can produce with no editing required.

DO YOU NEED THE CREATOR BUNDLE?

To the extent that much of Insta360’s “inspiration” for the Luna Ultra came from the DJI Osmo Pocket series, both the concept and composition of the Luna Ultra Creator Bundle is a page pulled directly from the DJI playbook.  With the Creator Bundle option, you’re spending $200.00 over the cost of the stand alone Luna Ultra – whether or not you need to do so really comes down to how much you may want or need the Mic Pro which is part of the Creator Bundle.  Not that the hard case, carrying case, and extended battery aren’t essential accessories (the wrist strap, and ¼” thread handle are less so IMHO). The accessory wide-angle lens in the Creator Bundle provides a 108 degree FOV and can be quite handy.  It’s likely about a 15mm equivalent in 35mm.

But you’re really only saving money over buying these items separately if you need the Mic Pro.  And many users will get by just find using the built-in mic and the remote mic.  Others will already have a wireless mic from another manufacturer.  For my purposes as a content creator, the Mic Pro is a “must have” accessory.

AN UNFINISHED PRODUCT?

As good as the Luna Ultra is, several aspects of the product feel unfinished. Whether that’s the result of a compressed development cycle or simply features that are planned for future firmware updates, there are several areas where the user experience feels “under cooked.”

Probably the biggest area where things appear to be “under cooked” is the lack of any sort of monitor assist when using straight I-Log.  On most cameras that offer a true log file output, then you look at what you’re recording through the LCD or viewfinder, the file lacks both color and contrast – just like the Log file format that the footage is being recorded.  But viewing that footage through the LCD/viewfinder makes it really difficult properly expose and in some cases compose the scene.  To overcome this, most manufacturers have some sort of a monitor assist feature.  Canon calls it “View Assist” while DJI calls it “Display Assist.”  But the idea is the same – the output file being recorded remains Log, but the screen shows a normalized image.  The Luna Ultra has no such feature.  Yet. This omission is particularly frustrating because I found I-Log footage could produce better results than the Standard Profile when properly graded. The problem isn’t the quality of the Log footage itself—it’s the workflow surrounding it.

Which brings me to their implementation of their I-Log + Leica filters.  Honestly, before receiving the camera I couldn’t quite figure out why Insta360 would enable the application of their in-camera filters to I-Log.  If the Luna Ultra was “baking in” a filter to I-Log, once you get the footage into your editing software, you lose the ability to push and pull contrast, exposure, and color as you should be able to in a Log file.  The Log file essentially becomes indistinguishable from the Standard Profile footage with a filter such as Leica Natural or Leica Vivid applied – redundant, if not useless.  If the Luna Ultra treated the I-Log + filter option like an in-camera LUT, there’s functional value.  Now you see a more normalized image on the LCD, but in post the output file behaves like I-Log footage with a LUT already applied.  In short, in my testing I saw instances of the I-Log +filter behaving like both of these scenarios.  I can’t say for certain if this was some form of user error, or if the inconsistent results I observed was some sort of Luna Ultra bug.  Either way the entire workflow here feels incomplete.  If I had my druthers, I’d prefer just having a monitor assist setting, and the availability from Insta360 of downloadable LUTs that can be applied in post.

The custom button functionality similarly feels unfinished.  The functions that can be assigned to the custom buttons are quite limited at this point and don’t always work the way you might expect.  For example, I’d like to be able to assign one button to toggle between Photo and Video modes, and the other to switch directly between the 1x and 3x lenses.  As of this writing however, I can’t assign lens switching to a custom button at all. The closest available option is the ability to cycle through all the zoom settings between 1x and 12x. Likewise, while I can assign a custom button to access shooting modes, pressing the button simply opens a menu on the LCD where I must then select either Photo or Video mode. It’s a workable solution, but not a particularly elegant one.  Interestingly during my testing, I discovered that if I was shooting in photo mode, then The custom button I had configured to change the zoom function exactly the way that I wanted it to in video mode – pressing the custom button simply toggled between the 20mm lens and the 60mm lens.

I want to stress that none of these issues are reasons not to buy the Luna Ultra – I think they’ll likely get addressed with firmware updates – I’ve already seen two firmware updates in the week since the Luna Ultra shipped.  And even if they don’t, they’re quality of life issues for me.  Not deal breakers.

CONCLUSION

I’ve tried to cover as much ground as I can about the Insta360 Luna Ultra within the limitations of a written article about a video camera.  I think to truly appreciate and make a buying decision, you need to watch the video below and see with your own eyes how I tested the various capabilities and modes of the Insta360 Luna Ultra.

Regardless of how you choose to use the Insta360 Luna Ultra, the quality of the footage is stunningly beautiful and the quality rivals the results that can be produced with dedicated mirrorless cinema cameras in some use cases.  It has remarkable capability for device you can slip into your back pocket and walk around with all day.  And I greatly look forward to future days with this device as Insta360 will no doubt expand the Luna Ultra‘s capabilities ane address some of the minor issues I identified through firmware updates.  Here’s my video review of the Insta360 Luna Ultra: