From my experience and from doing research for a long time on the subject there doesn't seem to be a magic bullet camera mount that solves all the issues a Aerial photographer may have with their machines. The main things being shaking from wind and vibrations from the motors and props themselves. In relation to this, how well the mount compensates for these effects. There are a few other things you want to consider when buying a mount. What cameras do you plan on using? Will it fit in the given mount? Do you plan on running wires? Will they get caught in a pivot point? ect..
Of the 3 mounts I've used in the year since flying my Hexakopter (The Patiro, the MD1, the MKTR,) I've not been extremely happy with any of them. I am still working with the MKTR to get things fine tuned and perhaps get some better results than I have been getting. So far the video off the MKTR is good but not great as I had hoped. Of the 3 I've tried I like how the MKTR tries to compensate for the vibrations that occur and IMHO it does a pretty good job of it with it's clever design but it does plenty wrong as well. My main grievances with the MKTR are the price and the amount of labor involved in assembly. It is a good mount and I'm still ironing out things on my Hexa as well as the mount to make it better. Another positive is the open back which makes it easier to run wires. I will report back further.
The MD1 mount is a mount I recommend for beginner or intermediate flyers who want a great quality mount but don't want to break the bank. It does an excellent job for stills and video can be very good. It does not do as great a job as the MKTR as far as vibration reduction but it's half the cost, takes almost no time to assemble and mount, and does take very good video. It looks great but does not have a geared tilt or pan. The good thing about the MD1 is that it is huge so you can use a multitude of cameras. It also has an open back so running wires for FPV is no issue. I'm a huge fan of this mount for it's versatility, it's simplicity, and it's durability. It was just not what I needed as I'm in search of super high quality video.
The Patiro is a slick little mount that we received when we bought our Hexa. It looks cool and it worked great for a time but had issues off the bat. The tolerances between parts where so great in certain areas i had to hot glue the parts together so they would not jiggle. The roll gear was belt driven and never centered right and the gear itself became stripped and unusable. We were forced to lock down the roll function which basically made the thing an overpriced one axis mount. Their is a pivot bar in the back of the mount for roll, it's what attaches to the belt and gear. This pivot bar made it easy to get wires caught or crimped if you were planning on flying FPV or had some other wires coming off the camera. The camera trey was very narrow and didn't allow for a variety of cameras. There was no real way to mount the thing either. I had to fabricate a mounting plate just so I could attach it to the hexa. I do not recommend the Patiro at all!
This is all off the top of my head and it probably sounds like it. I will add to it as I think of more information you may want to know. I will also add some video to show the examples of the three.
Eric
