P4P Still settings.

[sammackay23]

Hi all. Interested to hear what other peoples camera settings are for still photography. A friend of mine owns a spark and it seems to be a lot sharper than mine? I tend to always leave my aperture at 5.6. with iso at 100. Ive found myself sometimes doing video first then switching to photo and forgetting o take my ND16 of. Could that be making a difference? Should I be shooting in AEB mode? Maybe its what im doing in post? I edit all my photos in Lightroom just touching on the basics ie exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows etc.

Thanks

 

[Paul2660]

Shoot raw, Shoot in AEB, 5 shot. You will throw out at least 1 shot, but this is the only way to get a -1.34 to +1.34 range of exposure. I don't feel the files have a lot of push even in raw (shadow recovery), maybe .5 of a stop. They do have a lot of of highlight recovery, thus exposure to the right is OK. With raw, you can control so much more in the post processing, (sharpness, WB, color, saturation, etc). Some of these can be altered with jpg, but you loose more than you gain.

Adobe Lightroom does a good job on the raw files as does Capture One. If you have Adobe CC, then ACR. LR pulls more noise out of the files than Capture One, but Light has a seemingly OK lens profile.

The Spark has no focus, i.e. it's dialed into infinity. Spark's jpg engine IMO adds more saturation to the jpgs. However the Spark's jpgs will suffer in shadows, as the Spark applies way to much noise reduction and creates painterly looking shots.

Phantom 4 Pro has focus and you do need to focus it for max sharpness.

With an iPad or iPhone, with djigo4, you cannot see anywhere enough detail to focus a shot manually unless you are shooting up close. I use AF hit a spot off in the distance, then switch back to MF and stay there.

The camera does very good up to F 6.3, I try to stay in the F 4.0 to F4.5 range as diffraction will start to show up even at F6.3. Both of my P4 drones have a bit of corner softness, lower right on 1 and lower left on the other. But I usually can get around it.

As I understand it, you get the most resolution MP in the 3:2 ratio, however I set the chip to 4:3 as I do a lot of panos and the edge distortion is pretty harsh on the P4 camera (retrofocus distortion which makes pano create a bit more difficult).

The camera works well with a polarizer only, Tiffen makes such a filter, it's a bit heavy, but the gimbal will tolerate it. With the Polarpro ND/CL, I have a lot of trouble with AF and often the camera mis-focuses. But polarization helps a lot depending on the angle to the sun.

Files take a bit of work, but there is a lot of head room in the raws and end results can be very pleasing.

Here is a 3 part V pano, P4. Taken in Raw.

 

[Meta4]

A friend of mine owns a spark and it seems to be a lot sharper than mine?

Images from the Spark shouldn't look any better than from the P4 pro which has a sensor more than 4 x larger.
It might help to show an example of one of your images to show what the issues may be.
If you are concerned about sharpness, perhaps focus is the issue?
Are you focusing the camera correctly?

Ive found myself sometimes doing video first then switching to photo and forgetting o take my ND16 of. Could that be making a difference? Should I be shooting in AEB mode?

An ND16 filter cuts out 93.75% of the light which would mean you would be shooting at a much slower shutter speed than necessary, which could also contribute to unsharp images.
AN ND filter is of no use for 99% of drone still photography.
Unless you have a particular reason to want to slow down the shutter speed, don't use it for stills at all.
Shooting AEB won't do anything to address sharpness issues.
Neither would shooting raw.

 

[Paul2660]

Shooting raw IMO makes a huge difference with details and sharpness as with jpg you have noise reduction applied.
DJI is rather liberal in their jpg algorithm with noise reduction and once the detail is gone you won’t recover it in post.

I love the Spark for certain flights but as it only offers jpg (something DJI could change) I rarely use it unless I am after a 360 or video.

Spark 360 is an excellent tool for that application and pulls much less props than P4.

Paul C

 

[KevMo Photog]

Shoot raw, Shoot in AEB, 5 shot. You will throw out at least 1 shot, but this is the only way to get a -1.34 to +1.34 range of exposure. I don't feel the files have a lot of push even in raw (shadow recovery), maybe .5 of a stop. They do have a lot of of highlight recovery, thus exposure to the right is OK. With raw, you can control so much more in the post processing, (sharpness, WB, color, saturation, etc). Some of these can be altered with jpg, but you loose more than you gain.

Adobe Lightroom does a good job on the raw files as does Capture One. If you have Adobe CC, then ACR. LR pulls more noise out of the files than Capture One, but Light has a seemingly OK lens profile.

The Spark has no focus, i.e. it's dialed into infinity. Spark's jpg engine IMO adds more saturation to the jpgs. However the Spark's jpgs will suffer in shadows, as the Spark applies way to much noise reduction and creates painterly looking shots.

Phantom 4 Pro has focus and you do need to focus it for max sharpness.

With an iPad or iPhone, with djigo4, you cannot see anywhere enough detail to focus a shot manually unless you are shooting up close. I use AF hit a spot off in the distance, then switch back to MF and stay there.

The camera does very good up to F 6.3, I try to stay in the F 4.0 to F4.5 range as diffraction will start to show up even at F6.3. Both of my P4 drones have a bit of corner softness, lower right on 1 and lower left on the other. But I usually can get around it.

As I understand it, you get the most resolution MP in the 3:2 ratio, however I set the chip to 4:3 as I do a lot of panos and the edge distortion is pretty harsh on the P4 camera (retrofocus distortion which makes pano create a bit more difficult).

The camera works well with a polarizer only, Tiffen makes such a filter, it's a bit heavy, but the gimbal will tolerate it. With the Polarpro ND/CL, I have a lot of trouble with AF and often the camera mis-focuses. But polarization helps a lot depending on the angle to the sun.

Files take a bit of work, but there is a lot of head room in the raws and end results can be very pleasing.

Here is a 3 part V pano, P4. Taken in Raw.

Super sweet pano here man! Good info too Paul! I always use manual focus totally and never have to change it as I'm never shooting anything that is closer than 30 or so feet away. One tick off of infinity has always been spot on. And at night you def have to use manual focus for sure. Camera will focus all the way to front because of low light.

 

[sammackay23]

That photo is sharp as a tack, something im missing. I always shoot raw files. just for post. Im sure when I first got my P4P I was getting sharp images. Ill post a couple of examples, one from the weekend and one from when I got it. Might be my focus issue. I Normally shoot manual, dial in the aperture ands the iso and just shoot a single photo.

 

[sammackay23]

Here is one from the weekend.

 

[sammackay23]

Heres an older one.

 

[sammackay23]

This is a 3 shot AEB, edited in lightroom with my previous P3A

 

[Paul2660]

The aerial perspective is addictive. Nice shots

Paul C

 

[sammackay23]

Thanks Paul. Have you any points to make about these photos in terms of sharpness?

 

[KAOS Imagery]

Hard to tell from just looking at your photos. Can you provide us with the settings for each image, particularly the shutter speed? Also, when creating HDR images, the critical shutter speed is the one associated with the over exposed frame, i.e. the slowest shutter speed. I bracket most of my shots making sure the slowest shutter speed is fast enough for the given conditions. In other words, if it's windy and the AC is moving around or fighting to stay still, you will need a fast shutter speed or you risk blur in your image.

 

[sammackay23]

Thanks for the reply. I know the one of the river going up from the sea is 1/120, The one of the lighthouse on the cliff is f2.8 1/187 iso 100, exposure bias +1.3. This is the one taken by my p3a

 

[KAOS Imagery]

My P4P is significantly sharper than my P3P. I would say 1/120 is on the slow side if it was windy. I just looked through some of my more recent shot, most are in the 1/400 - 1/640 range, so up to 2500, not many below 1/320. At the altitude your shots were taken at, f/2.8 should be fine. I'd try that, keep iso at 100 and see what shutter speeds you get. If still low, bump the iso a little...but in good daylight the shutter should be able to be pretty fast. Also, there is a focus assist setting for the P4P, after you tap to focus, it zooms in so you can get a better view and see how in focus a scene is. Unless there is a problem with your camera, you should be able to get sharp photos. Definitely take the ND off for photos, just use it for video.

 

[Meta4]

Thanks Paul. Have you any points to make about these photos in terms of sharpness?

Take a few test shots without blocking out most light with the ND filter and see what that does.
Shooting raw won't make any difference to sharpness if you have a blurred image due to low light and slow shutter speeds.
I get great results shooting in jpg and sharpness is never a concern.

 

[Basspig]

Hi all. Interested to hear what other peoples camera settings are for still photography. A friend of mine owns a spark and it seems to be a lot sharper than mine? I tend to always leave my aperture at 5.6. with iso at 100. Ive found myself sometimes doing video first then switching to photo and forgetting o take my ND16 of. Could that be making a difference? Should I be shooting in AEB mode? Maybe its what im doing in post? I edit all my photos in Lightroom just touching on the basics ie exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows etc.

Thanks

I shoot RAW, 100 ISO, try to keep the aperture between f/5.6-8 and use no profile for the color.
Last night, I shot a sunset and on the monitor, the forest below looked black. But in Adobe RAW, I was able to open up the shadows and see nice detail on the trees below, while bringing in spectacular detail on the horizon's colors.
I think I can push it more than the RAW I get from my Nikon D7000. It certainly surprised me.

 

[Ripper7620]

I only shoot in RAW, and would only switch to RAW+jpg if I needed a full size preview in the field. I haven't tried shooting without ND filters, and usually use a Polar Pro ND16PL, unless it's cloudy, then an ND8PL. I always shoot with the ISO @100. Awesome pictures all the way around above, and I have much to learn before I can get any where near that kind of quality. I'm in the habit of chronically over saturating both video and stills at this point, as this picture shows. This is a JPG made from a RAW shot;

 

[Meta4]

I only shoot in RAW, and would only switch to RAW+jpg if I needed a full size preview in the field. I haven't tried shooting without ND filters, and usually use a Polar Pro ND16PL, unless it's cloudy, then an ND8PL.

Why do you use the ND filters if you are shooting stills?
See what I wrote up above in post #3.

 

[Ripper7620]

Why do you use the ND filters if you are shooting stills?
See what I wrote up above in post #3.

I just didn't know any better, I thought they helped with the picture quality of stills as well.

 

[KAOS Imagery]

I just didn't know any better, I thought they helped with the picture quality of stills as well.

Like Meta points out, NDs are more for video than for stills. There are a couple reasons why you would use NDs with stills - say you were hovering over a waterfall and wanted that cotton candy look to the water. The right ND might get your shutter speed slow enough to blur the water, like around 1/2 sec or more. So NDs are useful when you want to add blur to moving elements in a scene. If you wanted to make a drone hyperlapse without the staccato jumpy look, you could also shoot the stills with an ND giving a slight movement blur that will make the movement more fluid in your final product. But for standard everyday aerial shots, NDs are not needed or desired.