Hello guys

Took a few flights around the mud flats, beach huts and boat yards of Mersea Island on the Blackwater Estuary in Essex, UK.  
This was the first time I'd flown over open sea and wide expanses of water; tried to experiment with some panning and sidewards shots too, along with avoiding the seagulls around the boat yards.

I shot this in 2.7K on the P3S at 30 fps; editied in Powerdirector 14 and published in 1080p.

I'd be grateful for comments on how I can improve things; I've tried reducing the gains on the gimbal and pitch to slow down some of the movements, but the contrasts and colours may still need a little help.  Let me know what you think.

Cheers,

Ian

WOW !!   Ian,that is fantastic my friend!!...If i can get just half as good as that i'll be as happy as a pig in sh*t !!........What was the furthest distance you had the drone away from you?  Coz it seemed to be miles in places!! Lol

Ha, well, I went out around 700 metres out on the estuary...  Clear line of site made for good reception I guess.
Thanks for the thumbs up though; that's the good thing about editing; keep teh good bits; cut out all the crap bits....   This is around 25% of the video footage I shot

Ian

wellsi Posted at 2016-3-20 10:25
Ha, well, I went out around 700 metres out on the estuary...  Clear line of site made for good recep ...

Aloha Ian,

     Very nice subject matter.  I have to look this one up.  You had some nice camera movements to, many around that guy with the camera.  At first I thought you were harassing him, then I noticed him in many of your shots at different locations, so I figured he was with you.   

     Hard to go wrong with slow camera movements; and on path curves, keep the camera movements pointing the camera forward, backward or toward the inside of the curve - especially a tight curve or turn.  (When I do waypoints, I try to have the camera facing into the middle of the turn when I set the waypoint.  When you run the mission and use "Consistent with Record", the camera will give you the best shot.  Running the mission with the other two settings, you can face the camera out manually and see how rushed the turn looks.)

     When I watched your video full screen on a large screen (50+ cm) , there was some noticeable camera shake, but with smaller displays on the same screen, it was not noticeable.  The most noticeable areas were the beach huts and the boat repair and fuel dock facility.  Is that the camera or an artifact of the video conversions?  Also, when I reduced the size of the display, I could make out the depth of the water much better.  The channels became much clearer.  I though that was interesting.

     Is that haze a regular occurrence?  I noticed it in John's to (Essex John - Johnboy).  I think I have PowerDirector 13 but I have to look (I use PowerDVD 13).  Anyway, in the free download of Blackmagic's DaVinci Resolve 12, the gain option in color correction does a great job of reducing the haze.  I use it for the VOG here all the time - the tourist police require it.     I am going to see if that gain option is in PowerDirector.  If it is, then you could see if it gives you a benefit in your edits.

     Overall, your video was quite entertaining and you let the subject matter keep my attention.  I really like videos that let you see what is being recorded and yours was very rewarding.  Good job, keep it up!

Aloha and Drone On!

Cetaman Posted at 2016-3-25 08:08
Aloha Ian,

     Very nice subject matter.  I have to look this one up.  You had some nice camera  ...

Hello Cetaman
Really appreciate the feedback.  Yes, I was down there with a friend who was actively part of the shoot.  The seagulls dive bombing weren't an expected part though.....
Mersea Island is a tidal island in Essex that only has one causeway access point, so is completely cut off twice a day for around an hour.  It has a small town and a great set of boat yards as you can see. A really lovely isolated place only 30 miles from London. Being surrounded by marshalnd, that haze is quite regular and a great feature of the place I think.

I am yet to attempt waypoints; all that shooting was me flying it manually, so there was a fair bit to keep an eye on.  
I also noticed the wobble; it's on the original mp4 file so it's camera wobble; I need to get an ND filter to decrease my shutter speed. I will also knock my roll gain down to 80% as that's been mentioned on here to help.

I do have Resolve installed, although this was edited and produced in the full paid version of Powerdirector 14, which I find the most intuitive and easiest to use.  There are areas of the video I can play around with regards contrast and colour.  All a good learning curve...

Anyway, thanks again for your input; I was hoping you'd have a look and give me some advice.  Hopefully have another epic masterpiece up soon.

Cheers,
Ian

wellsi Posted at 2016-3-24 22:59
Hello Cetaman
Really appreciate the feedback.  Yes, I was down there with a friend who was actively ...

Aloha Ian,

     So that haze comes from the marsh?  Is it a mix of water vapor and methane or something?  In some places, the haze is part of the character and can even create a mood as you noted.  In our case with VOG, it makes you hack up galagala and at times today it was so bad you could not see five miles.  But that is what happens when you live 200 miles from an active volcano, even if it is on a different island.

     Mahalo for the information on the location.  I am into boats too, I guess you could tell.  Those marsh stream gullies were seriously cool to, BTW!  I have never seen that before.  That is one thing I liked about your video, you let the subject matter speak for itself.  The music really matched the video and the music itself was very interesting.  I liked the eastern overtones and nuances.

     I am glad you have a handle on the camera wobble.  There seems to be a correlation between sun direction and direction of travel and travel speed.  Get two out of three wrong and you get the wobble.  Watch out with reducing your shutter speed though.  Pans and rotations can get real jerky.  If you reduce your shutter speed, reduce your rotation rates to so the video is still smooth.  I usually recommend operators run between 30 and 60 FPS, but I have never had to deal with camera wobble before.  Pans and rotations fascinate me and I try to learn everything I can about those and related camera movements.  I will keep an eye out for your videos to see how it goes with the wobble.

     Good to hear what you said about PowerDirector, I forgot I had it and did not know what it was for since it came with PowerDVD and that was all I was interested in.  I keep looking for new editing programs since I am still learning and each program has its strong points and weak points.  It amazes me what I have learned from all you guys on the forum and the P3s are such a fun platform to learn with.

Aloha and Drone On!

That was very impressive Ian, a corner of the UK I've not yet visited. Some lovely shots in there keeps the whole thing entertaining. Only comment I would make is that it's perhaps a bit too long, this is only my perception of course.

Hey Wellsi

Not sure how I missed this before!

Awesome shooting it really captures the island well..Well done mate

-=RaM=- Posted at 2016-4-12 15:03
Hey Wellsi

Not sure how I missed this before!

cheers guys

It was a misty enigmatic day on the Island!

I know it's a bit long, but I primarily make these videos for me and my family's benefit and we like to see the whole day out   

Cheers,
Ian