Hi,

I just received my Phantom 4 today.  I took it out for a first flight today.  Video was great, but photos are horrible.  I first thought the lens was dirty, but the video footage is clean and in focus.  Anyone know what is going on.  I have attached an example.

I am shooting in Dlog with the sharpness turned down -3.  Could this have something to do with it?  I personally doubt that as the Video is crisp.

I am running the newest Firmware.

--
Gunnar

Looks ok to me?

Everything is out of focus. The 1080p footage is all in focus and sharp.

I thought it looked a bit odd at first but then I realised there is cloud being reflected on the water, muting the colour.  Are the faded parts of the sea  what you thought might be something on the lens?

D-log is very flat, but contains a lot of information. you need to process the images in post to boost contrast and colour. Also, digital images need sharpening. People set it low so they have control when in post.

Looks a bit soft to me, but it's hard to tell what's soft & what's atmospheric.  You need to upload a DNG file to dropbox for a proper evaluation.  Also, take a photo of something with identifiable detail, like trees on land.
Dlog shouldn't make any difference as it only affects colour & won't affect DNG files at all.

shutter speed/ motion blur?

I don't have RAW turned on.  Will do it next session. However with similar conditions my P3Pro  made much sharper pics.  The Windsurfer and Kites are horribly unsharp, so much so that I cannot get it sharp in post.  I've added another picture where there is a kite sort of in focus, but everything in the background is very soft even after sharpening in post.


Compared to this screen grab of the video:

granne@hotmail. Posted at 2016-3-23 03:54
shutter speed/ motion blur?

Was thinking that. Shutter speed was 1/749 (auto) for that picture.  But its not much better on pics I took with almost 1/2000.

The Video would be blurred too, if this was the case.

--
Gunnar

I did a few test shots in my office.
I now think its a problem with motion blur.  I guess the shutter speed was too low for the amount of shake the camera was subjected to.  It was realtilvly windy with about 17knots of heading on the example shot.

The picture from the office has a very slow shutter speed, but everything is quite clear.

I will test it again the next days if a much higher shutter speed solves this or not.

gunnar.biniasch Posted at 2016-3-22 19:59
I don't have RAW turned on.  Will do it next session. However with similar conditions my P3Pro  made ...

I think both the photo & the screen grab look similar apart from the exposure.  The video grab doesn't look better to me, it just looks like the dark exposure & higher compression hides the softness in the top part of the frame.

gunnar.biniasch Posted at 2016-3-22 20:22
I did a few test shots in my office.
I now think its a problem with motion blur.  I guess the shutte ...

This indoor pic makes me think the focus is off.  It looks like it might be focused too close.  If it was focused only slightly further out (say 0.5m further), it might bring the top of your frame into acceptable sharpness  There's clearly a slight misalignment causing the top of the aerial shots to go soft, but proper focusing will eliminate that.
The cause might just be the sensor isn't parallel with the lens, but focusing further out will bring that into focus at the expense of close focusing which is much less important.

Dlog will give you a flat photo and you need to make adjustments in post.
Try a few photos in Vivid and you will see the camera takes better photos than the P3 Pro.

DJI-Ken Posted at 2016-3-22 20:55
Dlog will give you a flat photo and you need to make adjustments in post.
Try a few photos in Vivid  ...

No it won't.  It's nothing to do with colours.  It's clearly soft in parts.

nigelw Posted at 2016-3-23 04:55
This indoor pic makes me think the focus is off.  It looks like it might be focused too close.  If  ...

How do I change focus range on the Phantom 4.  I cannot find a way to do it.

I just unscrewed the UV filter.  Should it the glass be completely loose? On my P3P the glass was properly attached to the ring.  Might the glass be vibrating in flight because it was forgotten to be glued on?

gunnar.biniasch Posted at 2016-3-22 22:27
How do I change focus range on the Phantom 4.  I cannot find a way to do it.

You can't, it's set at the factory.  Well, not without voiding the warranty.

Remember that Chinese people have poor vision. If you got a technician with a wrong set of glasses...well you focus is the best he could see.

Turn on RAW+Jpeg, The Jpegs are crappy out of the P3P I only ever use them to have a quick look at the actual picture when uploading to my PC or if I'm on the run, you will have to process the DNG's in order to get the best picture quality. Also this camera is only a 12mp compact lens, don't expect DSLR quality, there will need to be post production in order to get good pictures.

Dacon Productio Posted at 2016-3-23 15:26
Remember that Chinese people have poor vision. If you got a technician with a wrong set of glasses.. ...

Not that old one. During WW2 they said the Japanese could not see worth crap. They sure proved them wrong.

Well I did a test today.  When the drone is on the ground the footage is fine.  However after lifting of, everything blurs again.  It is probably the loose UV Filter vibrating. I have contacted DJI and hopefully they can sort it out.

gunnar.biniasch Posted at 2016-3-23 14:02
Well I did a test today.  When the drone is on the ground the footage is fine.  However after liftin ...

Sounds plausible.  I'd be tempted to test it in flight without a filter, then if it's ok, just buy a new filter or glue it.  DJI will probably ask you to send it in at your own expense, which will cost a lot more.

I did a test flight today with a third party ND Filter, and lo and behold, the footage and pictures are in focus.  

DJI have actually requested I send the Drone back, but I hope now that I have confirmed that its the loose UV filter glass, they can just send me out a new UV filter.

Once again the old pic with UV filter:

vs new Pic with ND filter:


So happy that it's such a simple problem and nothing majorly wrong with the camera.


Hope this helps out anyone else with the same problem.
--
Gunnar

gunnar.biniasch Posted at 2016-3-25 08:41
I did a test flight today with a third party ND Filter, and lo and behold, the footage and pictures  ...

Actually that blurred picture effect could come in handy.  Where can we buy the "loose-glass" filters?

Dacon Productio Posted at 2016-3-23 00:26
Remember that Chinese people have poor vision. If you got a technician with a wrong set of glasses.. ...

Well that's slightly racist.

I have a Phantom 4 with the latest Firmware (Release November 2016 I think) My UV filter glass is tight, but I also have horrible still image quality. It is so bad, I don't want to fly in still image mode because the quality of my live feed is also bad then (Or maybe it is because the FOV is more "Zoomed out"). In Video mode the image quality and live feed is just fine. I can get much better photos by taking "snapshots" of my 4K video in a video editor then the still images I take. Anyone else have the same effect with their P4?

i have the same problem i think. The image is very soft, sometimes a lot, sometimes less... When filming trees for example the image is so soft that it looks like an old phone... i have uploaded a video:

I had the same problem with a Vision 2 Plus, the video was always excellent but the pics were crap , the barrel of the lense was loose to the camera board and after turning back in to tighten the pictures were now clear and video remained the same clear Cheers