I am not normally one to be first inline for anything, however this time I was! I have been awaiting the right time to purchase a Mavic and was going to go for the pro, then the Mavic air came out and I watched everyone posting on how great it was and nearly bought one of those!
I knew the Mavic 2 was coming – the rumours were way back in January 2018. So I decided to take the time to save for it. Then I sold 3 older drones and then sat waiting. It arrived on Friday last week after staying in all day for DHL. Who were going to deliver on Thursday but ran out of time. Ahh the frustrations, ended up working on Saturday.
First flight Sunday, I had a go on Joolze’s Mavic pro way back in February and haven’t seen her since. That was when I decided I am going to get a smaller lighter drone for fun shoots.
So what is it like? Everything DJI said so far, I was so excited only some of the stickers came off before Joolze took photos!
Setting the drone up as a bit frustrating an activating it, took an hour and a half of messing. Switching it on and off, rebooting and closing and in the end it was deleting the dji go 4 app and reinstalling. Having just done that a week before, it means you must have the very latest. I did everything logged in to my DJI account.
Once activated I tried updating the firmware using the computer and cable and that failed but by app on the phone hooked to the wifi, it was good and done in 7 or 8 minutes – which is quite surprising it is normally it fails via app and only will update drone firmware via the DJI assistant.
Mavic pro 2 flies really nicely and it’s light and compact and I just know I am going to take this drone out for lots of shoots not sure about pro shoots as I have never been convinced a Mavic of any type cuts it for TV jobs. We will see the footage seems to measure up so may well be!
The colours on the stills are excellent. Is it way better than the phantom 4 pro, I am not sure. It is a tiny bit better. I don’t think I would race to change for that reason.
The pictures I took in raw and jpg as that is how I run my work flow for all stills whatever the camera, a drone make no difference and then in photoshop or lightroom you can tweak and get a better image. I deliberately under exposed some and others under exposed. I have only posted unprocessed jpgs. I have just run out of time! There are currently no ND filters available, although DJI may have sold out and I always fly with filters on.
These were shot on in hazy sunshine, after the clouds rolled in. So the real test for stills will be the bright sunshine with no ND filters.
Video – great smooth handling and I really enjoyed seeing the footage.
Slight aliasing on the stone wall in the video above but this can be remedied by the use of ND filters and other camera techniques / settings. This not as bad as I was expecting the P3P was not good but you learn how to overcome this. Occasionally you see drone footage on TV and I cringe when I see aliasing as it means no filters have been used and or its old tech. The inspire1 can be really bad for it with no filters.
As always I wasn’t afraid to send the drone a long distance from me (not beyond the legal 500m) and not once were there any disconnect issues. This may be well to do with the OcuSync 2.0 digital video transmission system.
This place is one of my practice areas and there are always disconnect issues with the i1 and the P4’s old and new! But I never panic about how I can’t see the image as it tends to come back after a flicker, it is frustrating and probably need to move to a crystal sky monitor for pro work.
I do believe it can be an issue with an i-pad mini. I just carry on and trust the image will be smooth if I fly smooth, because it will be but if you panic cause you can’t see the image then you will end up with footage that isn’t smooth. The image you see on the phone / i-pad is much clearer and so that must have been improved which to me is great as it is good to see what you are shooting.
I love the gimbal protector – really easy to remove and attach back on. When I got back to look at footage and stills couldn’t locate what I had shot and there it was on the drone – need to work out how to record on card and drone. Transferring the shots to computer using the cable really good very quick – as it’ s 40 Mbps but I am going to have to make sure I don’t loose the little adapter this adapter for the cable is a good idea you need the adapter for charging the controller. So cuts down on having two cables!
The sticks on the RC are removable for storage and easy carry you get spares but I won’t be removing them as I know I will loose them as well if I am not careful. I am careful but sometimes you know I am just human drop them on the grass and they will be gone!
So should I sell what I have and buy new?
My advice is always the same, it is really exciting seeing new kit arrive, and if you are in the market to buy a drone or what ever piece of tech it is, buy the latest or what you can afford – if that is 2nd hand off ebay from a trusted seller then so be it.
Remember this as soon as you buy a camera, a drone, a phone, a computer it is out of date! The R&D (research and development) departments are already working on the latest and in 6 months time your shiny new thing is old. So if you have a Mavic pro, a Mavic Air or P4P don’t despair – enjoy what you have and save for what is coming in 6 months time. Unless you have a business need or you are just about to purchase a new drone. Then keep, I have only just sold my P3P and took great footage and stills with that back in May.
Have you mastered all the features on your current drone? Do you know it inside out? Is there something else you can get out of the piece of kit you already own?
I think if you are two steps behind the latest and you want to do pro work then yes you need to be thinking about moving forward. But if you are only one step behind don’t worry about it, carry on enjoying what you have.
If you have good flying weather then do enjoy, it’s set to rain most of this weekend in the UK
Thank you for reading
The Drone Lass
x
The Drone Lass 