Hi DJI forum members!

It's been almost 2 years since we started abusing our Phantom 4 Pro and I want to share some of the experience we got!

The very first project involved flying in winter Romanian moutains with -16°C (3°F) freezing temperatures and strong winds. We warmed up batteries before each flight and had no problems whatsoever! I remember my first impressions about the footage – I could recover all that highlight detail in snow!!! At the same time there was enough shadow lattitude – combination of great sensor, processing and codec algorhythms (h.265 was introduced)

Then there was Greece – the first time we combined DJI footage with two Sony cameras (fullframe a7R II and compact RX100V). It was really easy to match the look of all three. During the filming of the southern Greece winds were unexpectedly gusty and I almost had our Phantom 4 Pro flip over a couple of times, but in the end we got the footage without any damage to the drone!

When it was time to make a winter film again – we decided to go for Scotland. We were "lucky" to have stormy weather during half of our stay and even nice days had gusty winds combined with low temperatures and moist. Weather messed up our plans quite a bit, but still we managed to film most of landmarks we intended to!

The latest project was the opposite of the first one. It was filmed in Portugal and we had extreme heat exceding +45°C (113°F) on several occasions! It was also the most complicated project permission-wise. Portugal has very intricate system where you have to get permissions from multiple authorities. Nonetheless we were humbled to recieve the first ever authorisation from Instituto de Conservação da Natureza e Florestas to fly over Sintra area.

In addition to our Traveller's Tales videos we have also used it on multiple other projects. For these 2 years out little Phantom 4 Pro has been through a lot with us! Now it's time to move on. We just added Mavic 2 Pro to our gear list. May be the image is softer a tiny bit, but I have 2 FOV to choose from in a slimmer travel-friendly compact form-factor (which also makes it more stable during high wind).

What was your most challenging situation with Phantom 4 Pro?

By the way, our first drone before P4P was a regular Phantom 4. I remember it changing the way I film anything, including handheld! It also made me feel more comfortable with a wide angle lens. We have only one clip we did with it – and it's by far the oldest one (from over two yeas ago)! You can definately see the progress, especially if you consider what percentage of the shots were usable at all back then

The funnniest thing is about the camera though – just before leaving for Norway my Sony a7S got under light rain and back LCD stopped working! The viewfinder was working only occasionally, so I had no way to know if the shots are any good most of the time. Was pretty much surprised that I have enough material ofter the trip!

Hi there, thank you for sharing your amazing and stunning video, well done. Fly safely. Cheers!

DJI Stephen Posted at 2018-10-24 06:58
Hi there, thank you for sharing your amazing and stunning video, well done. Fly safely. Cheers!

Thanks Stephen! First thread on a forum is always so thrilling

Can't wait to start creating more with our new Mavic 2 Pro! Have already taken it to South Africa but can't release the video just yet ^^

Wow wow !! Awesome collection !! Congrats

Looks like it is serving you well!

@Nebuchadnezzar @ALABAMA Thank you! I am genuenly surprised it lasted this long scratchless considering different types of weather we encountered ((=

Great examples of your work with the P4

That's stunning! Thanks for sharing. Nice video footage!

Very beautiful!

Videos are really high above average.
What I want to ask you, what do you expect from the Mavic 2 as you said that you can't wait to be more creative? Creativeness has nothing to do with Phantom vs. Mavic.
What concerns the picture quality the Phantom is still at the leading position. Mavic has some other improvements but certainly not the picture quality. But I must say it is pretty close to Phantom.  

A CW Posted at 2018-10-24 14:43
Great examples of your work with the P4

@A CW @DJI Panda @Montfrooij thanks guys! Sharing is the least I could do – not sure why I didn't post anything here before ^^

How cool is your work, if you need some one to carry your drone for you I’ll volunteer.

andy10 Posted at 2018-10-25 03:40
Videos are really high above average.
What I want to ask you, what do you expect from the Mavic 2 as you said that you can't wait to be more creative? Creativeness has nothing to do with Phantom vs. Mavic.
What concerns the picture quality the Phantom is still at the leading position. Mavic has some other improvements but certainly not the picture quality. But I must say it is pretty close to Phantom.

@andy10 Thanks Andy, we do our best!

I said that I can't wait to create more, not be creative – that I always strive for Having Mavic 2 Pro as a new go to drone for over a month already, I've only had a couple of opportunities to film with it, so I can't wait for more ^^

But to be fair, as a tool, Mavic 2 Pro gives more possibilities and does inspire creativity as well – first of all it has two FOV modes, which I mimicked a lot with zooming in on Phantom footage. Now we finally have that choice in camera and I can zoom in even further in post. There is also 10bit, hyperlapse, more reliable flight characteristics etc. which makes theoretically possible with Phantom stuff more streamlined.

Cheers!

Hartyaj Posted at 2018-10-25 03:49
How cool is your work, if you need some one to carry your drone for you I’ll volunteer.

@Hartyaj Thanks mate! Having upgraded to Mavic 2 Pro that is no longer an issue

Stanly Posted at 2018-10-25 03:44
@A CW @DJI Panda @Montfrooij thanks guys! Sharing is the least I could do – not sure why I didn't post anything here before ^^

Pleasure mate - look forward to seeing more of your content on here

EXCELLENT

that is a top selection you have posted Stanly. Great editing by the way. Now let's see more

Wow just wow, amazed by your video, really enjoy watching it, well done on making it

Stanly Posted at 2018-10-26 04:32
By the way, our first drone before P4P was a regular Phantom 4. I remember it changing the way I film anything, including handheld! It also made me feel more comfortable with a wide angle lens. We have only one clip we did with it – and it's by far the oldest one (from over two yeas ago)! You can definately see the progress, especially if you consider what percentage of the shots were usable at all back then

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VuIZq-LzKw

Stunning work! You have a talent sir

@Grumpy D @sky wombat @jacksonnai @A CW

Want to thank all of you for such a warm feedback! And also welcome everyone to share own weather / location challenges that you might've faced while filming and may be some insights of overcoming those ^^

Stanly Posted at 2018-10-24 07:10
Thanks Stephen! First thread on a forum is always so thrilling

Can't wait to start creating more with our new Mavic 2 Pro! Have already taken it to South Africa but can't release the video just yet ^^

Hi there, please let us know if you have other concern. We're here to help. Cheers!

Wow! Awesome videos, beautiful scenery plus the music you chose for the sound track fit perfectly.

Do you see that =]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]]] that's my jaw, it fall down on the countertop of my desk. I love the Scotland part, I need to go there one day and you can be sure it is thanks to you. Great videos! I watch them all, but scotland even more than once.

FatherXmas Posted at 2018-10-27 07:59
Wow! Awesome videos, beautiful scenery plus the music you chose for the sound track fit perfectly.

@FatherXmas thank you! Love editing to music, especially if the rhythm is not standart – one of those limitations that gives you freedom

@P3KoYoT thanks mate, yeah – Scotland is definately magical! We want to come back in a warmer season, when we have the possibility to ^^

Jealousy makes one nasty but though I`m Jealous of the places you have been I`m not nasty, in actual fact I`m thankful to be able to see your experience.
Please provide the locality info (preferably coordinates) for the following places in the Scotland vid.

0:04 Waterfall
0:29 Castle
2.56 - 3:23 Waterfall (same as 0:04?)
2:06 Castle

Thank you so much.

HendrikJB Posted at 2018-10-30 02:56
Jealousy makes one nasty but though I`m Jealous of the places you have been I`m not nasty, in actual fact I`m thankful to be able to see your experience.
Please provide the locality info (preferably coordinates) for the following places in the Scotland vid.

@HendrikJB thanks!

It is Kilt Rock and Mealt Falls – it is indeed the same as the one at 2:53! The castles are Castle Stalker & Eilean Donan Castle.

You can also check in the first comment on YouTube where we noted most if not all key locations from the video (=

By the way South Africa is also epic – had a very brief visit a couple of weeks ago, seen Blyde River Canyon, Kruger National Park and a couple of other locations around Nelspruit!

Cheers!

Stanly Posted at 2018-10-30 11:39
@HendrikJB thanks!

It is Kilt Rock and Mealt Falls – it is indeed the same as the one at 2:53! The castles are Castle Stalker & Eilean Donan Castle.

Thank you for your quick reply.

Next time you come around to the Cape. My wife runs an Air B-n-B.

I`ll take you up north to some beautiful scenery.

Very nice works!

Nicely done - thanks again for sharing.

Good job, love the edit and music choice.
Also the grading is consistent trough all the shots wich is something you don't see everyday.
I think your works stand out from the average videos posted on these forums.

Wow, very impressive work. Beautiful.

Wow, very impressive work. Beautiful.

HendrikJB Posted at 10-30 11:43
Thank you for your quick reply.

Next time you come around to the Cape. My wife runs an Air B-n-B.

Been away from the internet for a couple of days, thanks for the nice comments everyone!

@ HendrikJB thanks much appreciated! You guys have some nice views out there ^_~

@Elettrone78 happy you enjoyed it! grading everything together is a pain at first, but it's my favorite part of the process actually and since I got this Phantom 4 Pro with nice bitrate and h.265 codec it's at times easier to grade drone footage than dedicated camera! DJI is great at codecs, probably I'd say they are the best in this domain. For example Inspire 2 can fit whatever workflow you need on per project basis – high quality RAW, my favorite ProRes (they also announced ProRes RAW) and efficient h.265. One day I'll get to flying that class of UAVs!

I was sure I had remarked positive here already.

Ok, doing so now. Great job. Each and all. ;-)

Keep it up, only improves over time. Ha

Thanks for participating on the forum.


RedHotPoker

Stanly Posted at 11-2 14:23
Been away from the internet for a couple of days, thanks for the nice comments everyone!

@ HendrikJB thanks much appreciated! You guys have some nice views out there ^_~

grading everything together is a pain at first, but it's my favorite part of the process actually and since I got this Phantom 4 Pro with nice bitrate and h.265 codec it's at times easier to grade drone footage than dedicated camera! DJI is great at codecs, probably I'd say they are the best in this domain.


I find it rather difficult to mix P4P footage to my Canon 1DxII, colors are SO different and give me a headache every time, maybe because I'm still not quite good enough at it, anyway...I haven't tried h265 mainly because i often record at 60 fps for slow-mo stuff but what I can say about P4P h264 is that in low light color retention is really bad compared to higher end codecs.
Everything looks muddy and murky

Stanly Posted at 11-2 14:23
Been away from the internet for a couple of days, thanks for the nice comments everyone!

@ HendrikJB thanks much appreciated! You guys have some nice views out there ^_~

....."@ HendrikJB thanks much appreciated! You guys have some nice views out there "....

True however one needs to travel a bit away, excluding obviously our "Mountain Road" which is just a few km away.

Keep it up.

Wow, amazing. I love your energetic way of editing!

Thanks everyone for commenting! Happy you enjoyed our short films ^^

@Elettrone78 you should definitely try h.265 – gives a lot more flexibility for grading and correcting / matching color

thanks foe sharing !