DJI Mavic Pro II

[Snowbro]

17 hours ago, ErikSwan said:

With a little lot of temporal noise reduction, I'm getting some pretty impressive results out of this sensor.

Granted, there are some artifacts from the heavy NR, but it still looks quite usable to me.

Shot 30 minutes after sunset. For an idea of how little light there was, look at the headlights on the hill in the background at the start of the clip, the various phone screens you can see throughout, and the city lights in the background towards the end.

I haven't owned any of DJI's previous drones but I have a hard time believing any of the 1/2.3" sensors would have been able to get anything remotely looking like this.

 

 

Looks good! But why so jumpy? What were the camera & post settings?

[Emanuel]

34 minutes ago, Andrew Reid said:

Don't know if this has been mentioned before, but I wish I didn't have to buy two separate drones just to get the two different camera heads.

 

26 minutes ago, sanveer said:

That and making the cakera swapping seem so company process confined, is a ice way yo make mote profits. 

 

Indeed. Just wait and they'll release both models in a premium one.

I bet the shots you can get with the zoom as B-drone may not justify the outdated investment in a few months.

I wouldn't dare to infer the same about the PRO version available now and from today on, though. A unique piece of its kind.

[Robert Collins]

2 hours ago, Emanuel said:

Indeed. Just wait and they'll release both models in a premium one.

I bet the shots you can get with the zoom as B-drone may not justify the outdated investment in a few months.

I wouldn't dare to infer the same about the PRO version available now and from today on, though. A unique piece of its kind.

Still the best 'money grab' approach by DJI would have been to release the zoom first and then the pro 6 months later....

[Emanuel]

8 hours ago, Robert Collins said:

Still the best 'money grab' approach by DJI would have been to release the zoom first and then the pro 6 months later....

Fortunately, they didn't.

E : -)

[ErikSwan]

On 9/6/2018 at 4:07 PM, Snowbro said:

Looks good! But why so jumpy? What were the camera & post settings?

What do you mean by jumpy? Looks pretty smooth on my end.

Settings:
4K HQ (1:1 crop mode) @ 24 fps
H.265
DLog-M
Picture settings: +1, 0, 0

ISO 6400 (max in video mode)
f/2.8 (minimum)
I think shutter speed was 1/30 or 1/40 but I don't remember exactly.

[Robert Collins]

Here are a few thoughts on the Mavic 2 after a week or so of use. Mostly points that I have found that dont seem to get much mention in the youtube stuff.

1) There has been no firmware update so far for Crystalsky monitors, so you cant use the Crystalsky with the Mavic 2 yet. Pretty disappointing for an expensive accessory.

2) For some inexplicable reason DJI has removed quite a lot of the intelligent flight modes that were on the original Mavic Pro. The two that I used a lot - Course Lock (great for panning) and Waypoints are both gone.

3) Theoretically you can pan the camera from left to right (unlike the Mavic Pro) but in practice this has fairly limited practical use because the props get in your shot.

4) So you are likely to shoot quite a lot of video while flying left or right which is fine apart from the side obstacle sensors dont work (unless in intelligent flight mode or tripod mode.)

5) The DLog-M 10 bit h.265 profile is a huge step up from the Mavic Pro and is great in post. Unfortunately, the footage in DLog has horrendous lens distortion. Its easy to fix in post but rendering h.265 is pretty slow. (I am wondering whether it is best to transcode first for Premiere Pro.)

6) I like the 2.7k 60p footage. It is FOV and I assume pixel binned - so isnt the most detailed - however the 60p really helps smooth out the footage.

7) I never used 'autoexposure' with the Mavic Pro because of exposure flicker but I havent noticed any with the Mavic 2 when shooting shutter priority.

[webrunner5]

Nice info, thanks. Out of likes.

[omega1978]

12 hours ago, Robert Collins said:

Here are a few thoughts on the Mavic 2 after a week or so of use. Mostly points that I have found that dont seem to get much mention in the youtube stuff.

1) There has been no firmware update so far for Crystalsky monitors, so you cant use the Crystalsky with the Mavic 2 yet. Pretty disappointing for an expensive accessory.

2) For some inexplicable reason DJI has removed quite a lot of the intelligent flight modes that were on the original Mavic Pro. The two that I used a lot - Course Lock (great for panning) and Waypoints are both gone.

3) Theoretically you can pan the camera from left to right (unlike the Mavic Pro) but in practice this has fairly limited practical use because the props get in your shot.

4) So you are likely to shoot quite a lot of video while flying left or right which is fine apart from the side obstacle sensors dont work (unless in intelligent flight mode or tripod mode.)

5) The DLog-M 10 bit h.265 profile is a huge step up from the Mavic Pro and is great in post. Unfortunately, the footage in DLog has horrendous lens distortion. Its easy to fix in post but rendering h.265 is pretty slow. (I am wondering whether it is best to transcode first for Premiere Pro.)

6) I like the 2.7k 60p footage. It is FOV and I assume pixel binned - so isnt the most detailed - however the 60p really helps smooth out the footage.

7) I never used 'autoexposure' with the Mavic Pro because of exposure flicker but I havent noticed any with the Mavic 2 when shooting shutter priority.

Have you try the HDR(HLG) 4k ? is there a standard correction LUT for DLog-M from DJI ?

[Kisaha]

Does anyone has some flying footage to share?

I am editing some Mavic footage right now and it is really terrible in most ways.

 

[deezid]

4 hours ago, Kisaha said:

Does anyone has some flying footage to share?

I am editing some Mavic footage right now and it is really terrible in most ways.

 

Haha, Mavic Pro footage is inferior to many phone cameras actually.
The Mavic 2 Pro is a whole different league.

[Kisaha]

3 minutes ago, deezid said:

Haha, Mavic Pro footage is inferior to many phone cameras actually.
The Mavic 2 Pro is a whole different league.

Yep, I know, I mostly certainly will buy one soon-ish, I would like to see some aerial footage first and try the 10bit, a bit!

[Robert Collins]

15 hours ago, omega1978 said:

Have you try the HDR(HLG) 4k ? is there a standard correction LUT for DLog-M from DJI ?

Havent tried HLG yet but have some good footage with it. DLog-M is pretty sweet though. The problem I face is that it is in the middle of the rainy season here and the light is overcast and flat so that I havent had some decent light/DR to really test the video yet.

I have been trying the hyperlapse mode but tend to find the camera movement too fast and dont see a way of slowing down the drone - this rather uninspiring hyperlapse was slowed to 40% in post (quite probably user error.)

 

[austinchimp]

1 hour ago, Robert Collins said:

Havent tried HLG yet but have some good footage with it. DLog-M is pretty sweet though. The problem I face is that it is in the middle of the rainy season here and the light is overcast and flat so that I havent had some decent light/DR to really test the video yet.

I have been trying the hyperlapse mode but tend to find the camera movement too fast and dont see a way of slowing down the drone - this rather uninspiring hyperlapse was slowed to 40% in post (quite probably user error.)

 

Looks great. Not sure I would risk flying over such a built up area myself.

I've been testing one at work and I find the full frame 4k mode to be quite soft compared to what I was expecting. Apart from that, the drone feels very pro and I'm very impressed with the battery life compared to the version 1.

[omega1978]

19 hours ago, Kisaha said:

Does anyone has some flying footage to share?

I am editing some Mavic footage right now and it is really terrible in most ways.

 

footage from yesterday evening, way under exposed ;(

i am was in hurt to test all the function on the drone activetrack 2.0 is funny!!

1. Dlog-M

2. HLG

3. Dlog-M

https://wetransfer.com/downloads/f9cee47889dfc59f8a667aaf53e1f67320180912123453/cd86bc53cd584610ec59f018eab9a5d720180912123453/53f3e1

[Luke Mason]

6 hours ago, austinchimp said:

Looks great. Not sure I would risk flying over such a built up area myself.

I've been testing one at work and I find the full frame 4k mode to be quite soft compared to what I was expecting. Apart from that, the drone feels very pro and I'm very impressed with the battery life compared to the version 1.

Full FOV 4K is actually 2.7K upscaled, as the IMX183 sensor can either do full 5.5K readout or 2.7K readout, the Ambarella chip obviously cannot handle 5.5K supersampling.

See Table 3 Readout mode:

https://www.sony-semicon.co.jp/products_en/new_pro/may_2014/imx183_e.html

[ErikSwan]

On 9/10/2018 at 9:08 PM, Robert Collins said:

5) The DLog-M 10 bit h.265 profile is a huge step up from the Mavic Pro and is great in post. Unfortunately, the footage in DLog has horrendous lens distortion. Its easy to fix in post but rendering h.265 is pretty slow. (I am wondering whether it is best to transcode first for Premiere Pro.)

Do you have a profile you are using for correction in post, or are you just manually estimating the distortion parameters? I was also really struggling to edit the H.265 files in Premiere, but Resolve is much faster for me.

On 9/12/2018 at 9:18 AM, Luke Mason said:

Full FOV 4K is actually 2.7K upscaled, as the IMX183 sensor can either do full 5.5K readout or 2.7K readout, the Ambarella chip obviously cannot handle 5.5K supersampling.

See Table 3 Readout mode:

https://www.sony-semicon.co.jp/products_en/new_pro/may_2014/imx183_e.html

Do you have a source for this, or are you just guessing? The Ambarella chip in the Mavic 2 appears to be the H3 [1, 2] which should be more than capable of downsampling from the full sensor readout, seeing as the Ambarella H1 in the Phantom 4 Pro can do it, and the H3 can even capture and downsample up to 8K [3].

@Cliff Totten (who posted earlier in this thread), did some tests on the resolution of the sensor in the various modes, and it looks like Full FOV 4K does have slightly more resolution than the 2.7K mode [4], so it seems more likely to me that Full FOV 4K is using a pixel binning readout mode, rather than being upscaled from a 2.7K readout. Cliff's theory as to why the Full FOV mode is binned is due to sensor heating problems, which seems plausible to me.

Also, everyone is saying the sensor in the Mavic 2 is the IMX183, but is there actually any evidence for that?

Anyways, I think Cliff's test is a good argument for shooting in 2.7K instead of 4K if you want the full FOV. The resolution difference is barely discernible, so you might as well use that 100Mbps for better image quality/less compression rather than spending it on more pixels that aren't providing a real increase in resolution anyways. And hey, you also get 60p if you want it!

[1] https://mavicpilots.com/threads/possible-new-mavic-ii-ambarella-h-3-image-processor.45801/#post-538347
[2] https://tronicsfix.com/blogs/news/dji-mavic-2
[3] https://www.ambarella.com/products/flying-cameras/flying-cameras-products#H3
[4] https://youtu.be/EpETzfvbmD0?t=25m30s

[Robert Collins]

19 minutes ago, ErikSwan said:

Do you have a profile you are using for correction in post, or are you just manually estimating the distortion parameters?

 

I use the one that you can download for free from the foot notes with this video. It works well.

 

[Luke Mason]

7 hours ago, ErikSwan said:

Do you have a profile you are using for correction in post, or are you just manually estimating the distortion parameters? I was also really struggling to edit the H.265 files in Premiere, but Resolve is much faster for me.

Do you have a source for this, or are you just guessing? The Ambarella chip in the Mavic 2 appears to be the H3 [1, 2] which should be more than capable of downsampling from the full sensor readout, seeing as the Ambarella H1 in the Phantom 4 Pro can do it, and the H3 can even capture and downsample up to 8K [3].

@Cliff Totten (who posted earlier in this thread), did some tests on the resolution of the sensor in the various modes, and it looks like Full FOV 4K does have slightly more resolution than the 2.7K mode [4], so it seems more likely to me that Full FOV 4K is using a pixel binning readout mode, rather than being upscaled from a 2.7K readout. Cliff's theory as to why the Full FOV mode is binned is due to sensor heating problems, which seems plausible to me.

Also, everyone is saying the sensor in the Mavic 2 is the IMX183, but is there actually any evidence for that?

Anyways, I think Cliff's test is a good argument for shooting in 2.7K instead of 4K if you want the full FOV. The resolution difference is barely discernible, so you might as well use that 100Mbps for better image quality/less compression rather than spending it on more pixels that aren't providing a real increase in resolution anyways. And hey, you also get 60p if you want it!

[1] https://mavicpilots.com/threads/possible-new-mavic-ii-ambarella-h-3-image-processor.45801/#post-538347
[2] https://tronicsfix.com/blogs/news/dji-mavic-2
[3] https://www.ambarella.com/products/flying-cameras/flying-cameras-products#H3
[4] https://youtu.be/EpETzfvbmD0?t=25m30s

8K refers to hardware accelerated encoding, downsampling is almost always a computationally intensive CPU task.

If you look at the readout modes listed on the IMX183 page, 2.7K readout is pixel-binned, it's then upscaled to 4K in the FOV mode. I don't think it's the sensor that's prone to overheat, it's the processor since it's not capable of hardware accelerated 5K downsampling (Sony's BIONZ chip was purpose built for this).

[ErikSwan]

7 minutes ago, Luke Mason said:

8K refers to hardware accelerated encoding, downsampling is almost always a computationally intensive CPU task.

If you look at the readout modes listed on the IMX183 page, 2.7K readout is pixel-binned, it's then upscaled to 4K in the FOV mode. I don't think it's the sensor that's prone to overheat, it's the processor since it's not capable of hardware accelerated 5K downsampling (Sony's BIONZ chip was purpose built for this).

I'll quote the section from the Ambarella page (emphasis mine):

Quote

The combination of 8K video capture together with Ambarella’s advanced oversampling and image stabilization also enables higher video quality 4K video recording.

This seems to imply it can downsample 8K video to 4K.

Either way, we know the Ambarella H1 in the Phantom 4 Pro [1] can downsample the full sensor readout to 4K as shown by Cliff's chart tests, so the H3 should obviously be able to do it as well. I don't think the Ambarella SoC is the limiting factor here; there must be some other limitation, artificial or otherwise.

[1] https://madsrc.com/2016/12/08/inside-the-dji-phantom-4-pro/

[wolf33d]

I have hard time believing they would risk sell us upscalled 2.7K as 4K. 

Anyway I have flown the Mavic 2 twice and it's a beast. Great IQ both in photo and video. 0 noise unlike my mavic 1 and mavic air in daylight. DLOG 10 bit Full FOV is fantastic. 
Biggest disappointment for me at the moment: when using the amazing quick-shots (orbit, spirals, ...) it seems it can only record in normal color mode h.264. What a shame... 
I never used those modes before but realized they do things better than you can do yourself. For example on a mountain summit, you wan to orbit around the subject standing on the summit. It will orbit a lot better than you doing it manually. But the lack of DLOG and 10 bit in this mode is a shame... 

Overall amazing drone. IQ is incredible, range and signal quality and battery life are phenomenal. Super stocked.