I am getting the same noise problem with my Mini 2. I use drones for my line of work in content creation and I never had this problem with the Mini 1 with the same manual settings (ISO 100 and so on). As the OP stated, other videos from the Mini 2 look phenomenal with less noise than I have noticed on my clips. On top of that, one of my colleagues also has a mini 2 and his clips from the same day with similar settings looked a million times better with respect to grain.

We can probably rule out the youtube denoising as I had to take his raw clips for the project. It seemed to be compression\ artefacting occuring with movement and moreso with gimbal movement. It urks the hell out of me when editing and definitely does not look normal. It is weird to see people write OP off so quickly without taking time to understand what he was taking about. What a shame...

lemniscate Posted at 5-15 14:41
I am getting the same noise problem with my Mini 2. I use drones for my line of work in content creation and I never had this problem with the Mini 1 with the same manual settings (ISO 100 and so on). As the OP stated, other videos from the Mini 2 look phenomenal with less noise than I have noticed on my clips. On top of that, one of my colleagues also has a mini 2 and his clips from the same day with similar settings looked a million times better with respect to grain.

We can probably rule out the youtube denoising as I had to take his raw clips for the project. It seemed to be compression\ artefacting occuring with movement and moreso with gimbal movement. It urks the hell out of me when editing and definitely does not look normal. It is weird to see people write OP off so quickly without taking time to understand what he was taking about. What a shame...

Hi,

Can you please upload footage of the same location from yours and your colleague's Mini 2 for us to compare? If we can detect big difference than we should all return our drones as faulty and can use that example as proof.

The noise is definitely a thing, specifically it's temporal noise and not spatial. The lighting doesn't matter; it can be bright, overcast, sunset, etc. and you'll still get the noise.

I also have similar noise present while using a 4k action camera (slightly more so; the Mini 2 actually handles high contrast areas significantly better). It occurs when used while mounted to a helmet or stationary on a tripod, so the "movement" doesn't really make a difference.

It's kind of like an electrical buzz that most don't really notice until you point it out to them and they finally consciously hear it, but sometimes getting them to do so is like trying to get someone to see the old man instead of the woman or wine glass in one of those silhouette art pictures. It's there, some people just can't see it easily, if at all, due to how the brain works.

You could get lucky on a replacement and hit the sensor jackpot, but much like dead pixels on displays, overclocking potential of the same series of CPUs/memory/GPUs, you likely will just get another "average" instance of the product that falls within certain range QA standards with average results for the product.

have a similar problem.
videos made with it have noise/grainy in motion. I use samsung evo plus sd card.
I do not know what to do.

Attached video example https://disk.yandex.ru/i/uVAaKgUkJD1wTw (I advise you to download to see better). As soon as the drone flies straight, artifacts disappear.

Attached video example click (I advise you to download to see better). As soon as the drone flies straight, artifacts disappear.

Video looks underexposed. This causes noise. You have to know the limitations of the small sensor to get the most out of it.

I agree that footage is noisy even at 100 iso in good light. The only cure I’ve found is to use neat video software.

the codec seems to be the issue.

UPDATE: the issue is best seen in this resolution/framerate comparison graphic i made: https://drive.google.com/file/d/ ... 6V/view?usp=sharing

i made a side by side comparison video of different resolutions and frame rates. you can see the issue is strongest at 4k 30

tazztone Posted at 6-21 07:20
the codec seems to be the issue.
i made a side by side comparison video of different resolutions and frame rates. you can see the issue is strongest at 4k 30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MG_cfFZYOhM

Hi tazztone, great comparison. Can you please upload it somewhere else as YouTube removes a lot of noise produced by DM2?

Tuxtard Posted at 6-21 08:23
Hi tazztone, great comparison. Can you please upload it somewhere else as YouTube removes a lot of noise produced by DM2?

so the video consists of cropped videos (no zooming in (except to fit 2.7K to 4k)) which were encoded using DNxHR codec (so basically lossless)

from this i took printscreens which were edited in photoshop and exported as jpg 100% quality to produce this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/ ... 6V/view?usp=sharing (5.3MB)

tazztone Posted at 6-22 01:13
so the video consists of cropped videos (no zooming in) which were encoded using DNxHR codec (so basically lossless)

from this i took printscreens which were edited in photoshop and exported as jpg 100% quality to produce this:

Thank you for this test. This basically proves what I was thinking and saying all along. It seems that P frames are loosing quality too quickly. In a way this is a good find because it means that the problem is not with the sensor but with the encoder that can be tweaked. Maybe DJI should try switching to H265 as hardware should support it.

Tuxtard Posted at 6-22 01:30
Thank you for this test. This basically proves what I was thinking and saying all along. It seems that P frames are loosing quality too quickly. In a way this is a good find because it means that the problem is not with the sensor but with the encoder that can be tweaked. Maybe DJI should try switching to H265 as hardware should support it.

Yeah, just took my new mini out for a flight yesterday and looking at footage today and its extremely noisy and came here to see if other folks had found it.

I suspect that everyone who's claiming the footage is NOT noisy, may not actually know what noise is.

I am going to try running it through neat video later on, which should help, but I do suspect that it's just that the cmos sensor is very small.  I can post some test footage later on.

But main point is that yes, DJI Mini 2 footage is noisy at 4k/24frames.  I was shooting in golden hour so don't try telling me "shoot with more light"   :-D

djiuser_YoEEnnutrj0f Posted at 6-27 13:57
Yeah, just took my new mini out for a flight yesterday and looking at footage today and its extremely noisy and came here to see if other folks had found it.

I suspect that everyone who's claiming the footage is NOT noisy, may not actually know what noise is.

Hi Guys, I just purchased a Mini 2 yesterday and have the same problem. Before anyone goes on about shutter speed, iso etc etc I decided to do two tests, one with my ipad and one with the Mini 2. These videos both are at 4k 30fps, 100iso, H264, 100mbits, fixed aperture., shutter was variable on both well over 800.

Any ideas why the Mini 2 shows artifacts yet the ipad doesn't, I'm thinking it's the processing power of the Mini 2.




Originals;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MukD60LgyRWfY9_79RMODfAYeMBdX1t-/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Vhay4QV0hwkYCvdoa38y_foElHagaEPq/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qw3TP4KTtBzygnzScw6PWaZOBttD4FPk/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GL_ouK5ZBBvGhLaJuzphHhMAuKruDzFf/view?usp=sharing

the compression is horrible and needs to be fixed. something is definitely wrong with the codec. it's hardly fixable at all in post by neat video or any other temporal noise reduction software

tazztone Posted at 7-21 11:53
the compression is horrible and needs to be fixed. something is definitely wrong with the codec. it's hardly fixable at all in post by neat video or any other temporal noise reduction software

I just replaced my Mini 1 with a Mini 2 and the noise issue is night-and-day.  The Mini 2 footage is obviously, noticeably more grainy.  Shot in full daylight.  I'm not sure what's up with some of the earlier obnoxious & condescending replies telling the OP to 'get his eyes checked,' but clearly this is an actual issue that multiple users (including myself) are observing.

Tuxtard Posted at 3-31 22:41
Yeah, probably a post processing result. Here's how your clip looks like with a low level noise reduction filter applied:

http://media.itsinbox.com/upload/media/2021/3/1/8/22/329/6793/denoise.mp4

Hello Tuxtard
Witch program you did use for this?

Grt. André

Quality-wise the Mini2 is a flying smartphone: A tiny sensor which processes over-sharpened saturated images, leading to a somewhat “busy” and grainy footage in some circumstances, especially if ISO is pushed over 200 ISO. It’s very much a beginner/consumer drone, especially because you can’t tweak the image settings, e.g. sharpening/codec/color space. I would say the quality is amazing when taking the versatility of this tiny 249g flying camera into account. But if you need a more professional result, buy the Air2S and you will be more than satisfied with IQ with its 1” sensor, D-log and 10 bit codec.

Andre vd Weide Posted at 8-6 23:26
Hello Tuxtard
Witch program you did use for this?

Neat Video with Mavic Mini noise profile.

@jacob

i agree.

i bought the mini 2 because i could not see a difference in side by side comparisons of slow daylight flights. it's only after i worked with the footage myself where i could see the abysmal codec performance as soon as there is some motion between frames.
also i see lots of hot pixels when i do long (1sec) exposures.
dynamic range is also hard to work with. as are RAW files coz to replicate the built in jpg noise reduction, perspective corrections etc is hard. only to get mediocre results
would probably not buy the mini 2 again and go for a better sensor/codec. but the size and weight is great.

Hi all,
I just wanted to report that I face the same issue.
My Mini2 got replaced just month ago, so it's not an older units issue.
I know how to use a camera & how to set the ISO and shutter (&also aperture, if there would be aperture control on such a tiny drone).

Haven't tried to get ND filters to mask the noise with motion blur, but that's definitly my next step.

I'm aware that there seems to be no fix/patch/solution available at this point in time, I just wanted to support anyone, who has the same issue.

Cheers

itsmelenni Posted at 3-29 09:22
Hi all,
I just wanted to report that I face the same issue.
My Mini2 got replaced just month ago, so it's not an older units issue.

"Haven't tried to get ND filters to mask the noise with motion blur, but that's definitly my next step."

If there is noise present, it will not be masked by motion blur. Motion blur is optical, noise is completely electronic.

djiuser_iyS0CEz7xqMb Posted at 2021-4-7 21:20
I couldn't bring myself to wait weeks to return the drone to the States, have them examine it, and then ship me another one from China....patience is not my virtue

It's been a while since I've taken my Mini 2 out for a spin but I see where your coming from. I'll try to find the video in the next couple days but I remember being amazed how great the quality  of a video I took with the Mini 2 following a  barge down the Mississippi. It did look much sharper than your videos but I always use ND filters on all my drones to get close to double shutter speed vs frame rate

For comparing cameras it would be better to use RAW pictures taken of the same object under the same (or at least very similar) lighting conditions.
That provides you the sensor output, not post-processed material as with any video file we can pull out of the drone. As already mentioned, YT does also do some post-processing, thus you can never know if a fault occurs due to sensor issues or YT post-processing.
So I guess collecting different video samples would be just a greater waste of time.
Choose a common subject like a test chart, agree on the distance from the camera and the camera's angle, try to achieve identical lighting conditions, light coming from the same direction, identical light temperature. That won't be easy and still won't get you 100 % comparable footage - but it will get you near.

My experience: The sensor IS noisy, I also found noise in very bright areas of photos I took in bright sunshine, noise everywhere, even in the sky or in clouds.
The dynamic range is also quite low, in addition, photo quality also depends on the subjects you frame and their color composition.

I watched the first linked video on my netbook, no magnification, no "pixel peeping" (which is often used as a kind of swear word, but in fact it's a very important step if you really want to know what your sensor is capable of - and because details all contribute to the overall experience).
To the starter of this thread: As far as I can say, your Mini 2 camera just behaves in a plain normal way. This does not mean it provides great quality, great dynamic range, colour rendition or detail resolution - things the Mini 2 camera just cannot deliver. Your camera just performs like all the other Mini 2 cameras out there.
You'll experience a better "feel of quality" if you record higher-contrast footage with more different colours, less dominated by brownish or greenish hues. Try urban settings or other areas with stronger color/brightness contrasts - you'll immediately feel a higher sense of quality. There will still be noise, but it won't be that prominent as with footage showing elements of similar brightness and colour.
The camera is no high-end camera, it just can't given the price. It's a very subject-dependant camera which can show muscles and weaknesses all according to the footage recorded - and the depth of pixel peeping.

In short: All okay with your camera.
Addition: ND filters won't improve the picture quality, just change (sometimes improve, sometimes worsen) the perception of motion.

Geebax Posted at 3-29 14:20
"Haven't tried to get ND filters to mask the noise with motion blur, but that's definitly my next step."

If there is noise present, it will not be masked by motion blur. Motion blur is optical, noise is completely electronic.

Hi!
You're probably right, but my guess is, that the noise is stronger, the more detail there is in a given shot.
Blur, and thus, less detail, would maybe fix that.

itsmelenni Posted at 3-30 03:51
Hi!
You're probably right, but my guess is, that the noise is stronger, the more detail there is in a given shot.
Blur, and thus, less detail, would maybe fix that.

Tach auch, Landsmann! ;)
Blur increases the size of areas. And where does noise usually show up, which parts of the picture are especially affected by video compression artifacts? ;)
But there indeed might be situations where e. g. a big white blur masks noise in darker background areas or just distracts the eye.
So it's surely worth a try - but don't count on the results.

Moin!
I've uploaded a sample to maybe describe the issue better. Video is directly out of camera. ISO100, shutter probably around 1/120.
The first view frames look great, but the second the drone starts moving at around 0:01 the grain in roots, twigs, leaves and dead needles becomes utterly ugly imo.
At around 00:11 the images starts to look a lot better (and not just because I'm in the shot now), but the dead forest "above" me still looks noisy.
Not sure, if this is something that can be fixed somehow, but it's still a huge bummer.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y9l9E04S4g5Wme8ukkZQsx_knr0BJOCd/view?usp=sharing


It's also super depressing how dead the forest is around here.

itsmelenni Posted at 3-30 09:29
Moin!
I've uploaded a sample to maybe describe the issue better. Video is directly out of camera. ISO100, shutter probably around 1/120.
The first view frames look great, but the second the drone starts moving at around 0:01 the grain in roots, twigs, leaves and dead needles becomes utterly ugly imo.

There are two issues here, the first is using the Google Drive player, it is crap. I downloaded the file and looked at it using VLC Player and it is quite reasonable. Plus, the Google drive player forces you to view a very poor 1080p copy of the file.

The second issue is one that shows up every year at this time, people shooting footage in forests bare of leaves. The camera processes its image using a compression method based on MPEG, and MPEG relies on much of the image being the same from frame to frame, so if the shot is full of fine detail, and the image on the screen is constantly changing due to a zoom or pan movement, the encoder has difficulty coding it properly. As the shot zooms out, the viewed image improves until just near the end it is quite acceptable. Increasing the bit rate would improve the situation, but the camera has a 100 megabit/second upper limit, and it is just not fast enough to deal with that shot.

Yes, there is apparent noise, but only in the early stages of the shot, however it is actually not noise but compression artifacts caused by the encoder being overloaded.

Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do to improve the situation or correct it in post production, the only two options that are avaialbe to you is to first download a free copy of VCL Player, and secondly, avoid that type of shot.

itsmelenni Posted at 3-30 09:29
Moin!
I've uploaded a sample to maybe describe the issue better. Video is directly out of camera. ISO100, shutter probably around 1/120.
The first view frames look great, but the second the drone starts moving at around 0:01 the grain in roots, twigs, leaves and dead needles becomes utterly ugly imo.

ReTach! ;)

Geebax is right, video compression hits it's limits, resulting in a blurry mess in some or most parts of the picture. Just see what I wrote in post 64: You'll experience a better "feel of quality" if you record higher-contrast footage with more different colours, less dominated by brownish or greenish hues. Try urban settings or other areas with stronger color/brightness contrasts - you'll immediately feel a higher sense of quality.
It's a well-known phenomenon we know from the early days of low-quality JPG compression: cameras heavily struggling with rendering foliage, greenery, twigs and the like, turning such subjects into a sludge.
Higher bandwidth, more sensor dynamic range could help - but I guess the Mini 2's processor isn't capable of delivering more bandwidth or using the more CPU-heavy H.265 compression, the camera unable to provide an enhanced dynamic range. Plus, the camera's output is quite noisy - easily to be seen if you zoom into still photos.
Thus it's a combination of software and hardware limits, showing it's ugly side with the kind of footage you captured.
Only remedy: Wait for the world becoming a bit more colorful and contrasty.

Geebax Posted at 3-30 15:02
There are two issues here, the first is using the Google Drive player, it is crap. I downloaded the file and looked at it using VLC Player and it is quite reasonable. Plus, the Google drive player forces you to view a very poor 1080p copy of the file.

The second issue is one that shows up every year at this time, people shooting footage in forests bare of leaves. The camera processes its image using a compression method based on MPEG, and MPEG relies on much of the image being the same from frame to frame, so if the shot is full of fine detail, and the image on the screen is constantly changing due to a zoom or pan movement, the encoder has difficulty coding it properly. As the shot zooms out, the viewed image improves until just near the end it is quite acceptable. Increasing the bit rate would improve the situation, but the camera has a 100 megabit/second upper limit, and it is just not fast enough to deal with that shot.

Only reason I uploaded to google was quick access
I have all my files in raw/original on my mac and pc and view them there, either via VLC or mac preview.

Thanks for the advice!

Landey Posted at 3-30 22:26
ReTach! ;)

Geebax is right, video compression hits it's limits, resulting in a blurry mess in some or most parts of the picture. Just see what I wrote in post 64: You'll experience a better "feel of quality" if you record higher-contrast footage with more different colours, less dominated by brownish or greenish hues. Try urban settings or other areas with stronger color/brightness contrasts - you'll immediately feel a higher sense of quality.

> Only remedy: Wait for the world becoming a bit more colorful and contrasty.


That'll happen hopefully soon.
Thanks!

I am simply baffled by some users here claiming they don't see the extremally unnatural grain/noise in the original post (by djiuser_iyS0CEz7xqMb). Or the ones saying "you got what you paid for"... In the ideal conditions Mini 2 is outstanding with the image quality far better to what the OP uploaded.

Purple Parus Posted at 4-16 14:02
I am simply baffled by some users here claiming they don't see the extremally unnatural grain/noise in the original post (by djiuser_iyS0CEz7xqMb). Or the ones saying "you got what you paid for"... In the ideal conditions Mini 2 is outstanding with the image quality far better to what the OP uploaded.

Obviously you didn't read everything - which of course could be quite a chore.

But if you did, you would have noticed that the "you get what you paid for" guys like me also said what you missed so badly.

Merhaba. Bu iletiyi Türkçe yazmak zorundayım. Umarım çeviri yapabilirsiniz. Aynı sorun benim cihazımda da var. iki farklı mini2 ile çekilen resimleri ekliyorum. Bunlar ekran görüntüsü ancak fotoğraflarda resimlerin olduğu yere bakarsanız ikisi arasından bariz farkı görebilirsiniz. Bu gerçekten çok üzücü.

HakomanTR Posted at 10-4 05:11
Merhaba. Bu iletiyi Türkçe yazmak zorundayım. Umarım çeviri yapabilirsiniz. Aynı sorun benim cihazımda da var. iki farklı mini2 ile çekilen resimleri ekliyorum. Bunlar ekran görüntüsü ancak fotoğraflarda resimlerin olduğu yere bakarsanız ikisi arasından bariz farkı görebilirsiniz. Bu gerçekten çok üzücü.

Hi there. Thank you for reaching out and we do apologize for the trouble. Please try to reset the camera parameters and check if the issue persists. To reduce noise, set the ISO value to about 100-200. The ISO value should not exceed 400; otherwise, the image quality will be greatly reduced. If the image is too dark, the right amount of exposure can be achieved by enlarging the aperture, reducing shutter speed, or brightening the photo after it’s been taken. Please keep us posted. Thank you.