The specs of the Mini 3 say there should be HDR enabled in video of 30fps (or less), however some people think the HQ option in the frame rate is just noise reduction.


This video runs through a comparison of 4k30 vs 4k48, and there is obviously no difference in exposure of sky vs. foreground.




However, when you get to his comparisons of HDR "Single Shot" pictures vs. 48MP, you get to one picture where the HDR content is the same as in the videos. In the 48MP version, the sky is obviously blown out. This gives the impression that the video is the same as the HDR shots, no matter what frame rate.



I've been looking at what D-Cinelike is. VLC says it's 10 bit LE. I presume LE might be logarithmic encoding, but google is playing dumb. I need some freeware to even experiment with it, because my normal video software is rejecting it.

Interesting to see!

Thanks for sharing.

Interesting comparisons.    To my eyes HQ doesn't look any better than the higher frame rate.  

Thanks, interesting comparison.

The video you posted to YouTube is not an HDR video, then you cannot expect to see any difference between the two modes, because the videos are both flattened to a Rec 709 8 bits color space.
If you want to obtain a 10 bits HDR video from the D-Cinelike file, you need to import it in a video editing software as a REC 2020 color space (HLG or PQ) and then to do some color grading. When finished,  you can export it to a true HDR 10 bits mp4 video file. At that point you'll be able to appreciate the full dynamic range of a HDR video. On my YouTube channel ( https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzGivlymgBLFY1N_O087OGw ) I posted several videos taken with DJI drones (Mini 2 and Air 2s). When played with a HDR device (a smart TV, an iPhone or a MacBook for instance) the dynamic range  of the HDR video  is really different from the one of non-HDR.

Thanks for the colour space info, Fabio

Here's what I've managed to figure out, by dicking about:

The photo mode has 4 tags:   ( + my guess what they are)
single:    rapid sensor shot to make 8 bit. ( Used in 48MP and dull cloudy Single Shots )
hdr:        slower double sensor shot, to make ~10 bit, then flattened to 8 bit  (to let us see into shadows and expose the sky better. This is normal for Single Shot mode.)
aeb_sdr:   power version of the above, obviously taking about 3 pictures, either in 8 bit, or slow 10 bit, then doing a merge. ( Used when there is a crack of light in the distance between clouds )
hn:         high noise ( Used in dim rooms. Indicative of noise filter being applied. )

I suspect that "normal" and D-cine video mode work in the slow 10 bit double exposure mode most of the time, especially in bright sun. That's the way I account for strange effects that I see. But Normal video is flattened back into 8 bit space, no matter what frame rate you use. However, sometimes I suspect it's shooting in "single" 8 bit mode. But I haven't pinned down when.

In these two pictures, the bird attacking my drone (far right) looks like it was inserted clumsily with photoshop.
In the second photo, it looks like I live in a Mexican rainforest.

Zoooom Posted at 12-1 17:22
Thanks for the colour space info, Fabio

If you put the two D-Cinelike files to a file sharing site and let me to download them, I'll try to post process them, giving you a true HDR video.

So what's the bottom line? Is HQ mode any better than normal? I've also simulated the scene containing large overexposed and underexposed areas, filmed it in HQ 30 fps and Normal 60 fps (both D-Cinelike) and couldn't see no differences either with naked eye, or with Premiere lumetri scopes histograms. That "double ISO", how to actually see that it works?

DJI Tony answered in another thread, that DCG HDR was used in 30fps, but I suspect it gets used more. But in any case, he gives a load of ways to try to disable it.

Hi, Daniel. Thank you for reaching out, and apologies for any inconvenience caused. In Single Shot Photo mode, HDR is automatically enabled for better dynamic range once the drone recognizes the scene. The photos taken in Single Shot mode will have no HDR effect in the following situations:
a) When the aircraft is in motion or stability is affected due to high wind speeds;
b) When using FocusTrack;
c) When white balance is set to manual mode;
d) The camera is in Auto mode, and the EV setting is adjusted manually;
e) The camera is in Auto mode, and the AE lock is turned on;
f) The camera is in Pro mode.
Additionally, DJI Mini 3 Pro also supports recording in DCG HDR. This shooting mode is enabled by default if recording videos at 24/25/30 fps.

They must be using this sensor.




The HDR mode is considered to be a double read of the sensor, because they tag non-HDR pics with "single".
There is a possibility that HQ means more 264/265 processing quality. This means that when you use 60fps, the quality may inherently go up, because of less difference between frames.

The data rate also goes from 45 to 72, so even with less processing, it will look better.

https://forum.dji.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=280383

Is not HDR....in fact is a double exposure that if is made at night creates an ugly ghosting as one exposure is slower...but far from real HDR....
A HDR contains HDR Container and is far better.
End of story.

Zoooom Posted at 12-14 07:01
DJI Tony answered in another thread, that DCG HDR was used in 30fps, but I suspect it gets used more. But in any case, he gives a load of ways to try to disable it.

Hi, Daniel. Thank you for reaching out, and apologies for any inconvenience caused. In Single Shot Photo mode, HDR is automatically enabled for better dynamic range once the drone recognizes the scene. The photos taken in Single Shot mode will have no HDR effect in the following situations:

Yes, the sensor can do a lot, the problem is that DJI used a Limited RGB mode, that is cutting 16 steps of shadow and 16 steps of highlights, killing Dynamic Range a lot.
This is why a really good sensor have a mediocre result.

Geo_Drone Posted at 12-19 01:18
Yes, the sensor can do a lot, the problem is that DJI used a Limited RGB mode, that is cutting 16 steps of shadow and 16 steps of highlights, killing Dynamic Range a lot.
This is why a really good sensor have a mediocre result.

Tried lowering noise reduction and sharpening to -2?
Results here are quite exceptional actually with these settings when underexposing to maintain highlights and recovering shadows in post later.

With standard settings everything is gone.

55Media Posted at 12-19 05:28
Tried lowering noise reduction and sharpening to -2?
Results here are quite exceptional actually with these settings when underexposing to maintain highlights and recovering shadows in post later.

Reduction of sharpening at -1 is enough, reduction of NR at -1 was OK.
But the Limited RGB range is not about this, you can play as you want with Sharp and NR, will not bring back that 32 shades cut.
Also because of this, I can see actually under 9 stops in DR, when at E2P in HDR+LOG mode i have seen 12 steps, being a huge difference at editing.
Cheers.

Geo_Drone Posted at 12-21 01:26
Reduction of sharpening at -1 is enough, reduction of NR at -1 was OK.
But the Limited RGB range is not about this, you can play as you want with Sharp and NR, will not bring back that 32 shades cut.
Also because of this, I can see actually under 9 stops in DR, when at E2P in HDR+LOG mode i have seen 12 steps, being a huge difference at editing.

What does E2P mean?
Do you think that DR has been cut before storing as H265?
Because the files themself seem to be stored in Video (legal) range. There's indeed a hard "cut" showing on the Parade and Waveform in Resolve in shadow and highlight areas.

Speaking of post-processing: -2 for both got me the best results, completely fixes the chroma clouding in darker areas as well as lots of the ghosting issues (temporal NR).

Underexposed

Overexposed

55Media Posted at 12-21 03:29
What does E2P mean?
Do you think that DR has been cut before storing as H265?
Because the files themself seem to be stored in Video (legal) range. There's indeed a hard "cut" showing on the Parade and Waveform in Resolve in shadow and highlight areas.

Resolve is interpreting it as Limited, is not about this.
Is about how much info you can recover from lower and highlights.
Limited Range RGB works like this:
All under 16 = 0 (so deep shadows will be black without info).
All over 239 up to 255 = pure white (spectacle highlights will be all white without info).
You cannot recover in this range as you have nothing to recover, being pure black and white.
As DR is given by how much you can recover as info between range 0-255 (also for 10bit will be 0-1024 but is the same rule), is restrained with around 20%.
E2P is Evo2Pro.

Geo_Drone Posted at 12-21 23:00
Resolve is interpreting it as Limited, is not about this.
Is about how much info you can recover from lower and highlights.
Limited Range RGB works like this:

Oh, I know what it means, am a colorist myself, haha.
Just can confirm, that luma values after 235 and before 16 seem to be cut off artificially limiting dynamic range quite a bit.
Would never buy anything from Autel anyway, their processing is the worst on the market sadly.

Dear All,

I made 2,7k video with my DJI Mini 3 Pro, but the drone makes 2688 × 1512 size video instead of 2.7K (2720×1530). Where is the missing pixels?
Do you know why? (If I know right this resolution was earlier models.)

Thanks for your answer!

55Media Posted at 12-27 01:40
Oh, I know what it means, am a colorist myself, haha.
Just can confirm, that luma values after 235 and before 16 seem to be cut off artificially limiting dynamic range quite a bit.
Would never buy anything from Autel anyway, their processing is the worst on the market sadly.

I confirm, related to service Autel is a pain in xxxx....

Are there any codec extensions for Windows 11 / MacOs Ventura that will allow compatible viewing of the D-Cinelike format that it is saved to without using like Premier Pro or Final Cut?

Geo_Drone Posted at 12-27 07:18
I confirm, related to service Autel is a pain in xxxx....

So now, maybe lets start a thread about cut off luma values.

This is an interesting discussion. I would need to take a closer look but there are some interesting things, like the frame rate recording as it's mentioned in many YT videos. It does make a difference.  

'Cinelike' is a gamma curve used when shooting videos which has a wider dynamic range than Rec709[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._709]Rec.709[/url] which you would be shooting otherwise. On top of that, Cinelike records in 10-bit (1024 levels of detail) vs 8 bit (256), hence can be graded easier without falling apart. There is an even wider curve called 'LOG' which we do not yet have on this drone, unfortunately.
That said, you will need professional NLE software like Resolve Studio to do just that (the basic free version does not support 10-bit)
This is what makes this a 'Pro' version.
Now would be nice to have other Pro features like programmable waypoints, vignette & colour shift corrected DNGs, full 360 spheres and 3rd party SDK support, if someone's listening ;-)

AVsupport Posted at 12-27 16:37
'Cinelike' is a gamma curve used when shooting videos which has a wider dynamic range than Rec709Rec.709[/url] which you would be shooting otherwise. On top of that, Cinelike records in 10-bit (1024 levels of detail) vs 8 bit (256), hence can be graded easier without falling apart. There is an even wider curve called 'LOG' which we do not yet have on this drone, unfortunately.
That said, you will need professional NLE software like Resolve Studio to do just that (the basic free version does not support 10-bit)
This is what makes this a &aposro' version.

Good explanation.
Also need to say that when you record on D-Cine, pay attention to histogram to be aligned in the right part instead of left, because is easy to blow the highlights.
The curve of D-Cine is non-linear, shadows remain in place, just from middle to highlights will gain more and more, so is important to have the highlights inside histogram (the right part of it) without going over the limit.
Still, because of this Limited RGB and cut off in DR, PAY ATTENTION to interpret the video as LIMITED and not FULL, or you will double crush the blacks (the drone is already crushing that 0-16  darks, you will see histogram in Premiere higher than it is and will go to 0 again, disregarding that 16 is 0).
Of course, each TV have their own modality to deal with FULL and Limited, if is corect set, you cannot see a difference....but is not correct, will crush again the blacks and you will loose all details from 0 practically to 32, instead of 16....so if you need Limited, play it limited, set it at export as LIMITED.
If you need FULL....well...take another drone ))))...

Zoooom Posted at 2022-12-14 07:01
DJI Tony answered in another thread, that DCG HDR was used in 30fps, but I suspect it gets used more. But in any case, he gives a load of ways to try to disable it.

Hi, Daniel. Thank you for reaching out, and apologies for any inconvenience caused. In Single Shot Photo mode, HDR is automatically enabled for better dynamic range once the drone recognizes the scene. The photos taken in Single Shot mode will have no HDR effect in the following situations:

Useful info. Thanks!

Zoooom Posted at 2022-12-14 07:01
DJI Tony answered in another thread, that DCG HDR was used in 30fps, but I suspect it gets used more. But in any case, he gives a load of ways to try to disable it.

Hi, Daniel. Thank you for reaching out, and apologies for any inconvenience caused. In Single Shot Photo mode, HDR is automatically enabled for better dynamic range once the drone recognizes the scene. The photos taken in Single Shot mode will have no HDR effect in the following situations:

DJI Tony can answer why DJI implementation of sensor gives in HQ mode a strong ghosting, as the promo posted says is NO GHOSTING... ))) but we can see HUGE amount of ghosting in low light if we stay in HQ mode

Geo_Drone Posted at 1-19 04:06
DJI Tony can answer why DJI implementation of sensor gives in HQ mode a strong ghosting, as the promo posted says is NO GHOSTING... ))) but we can see HUGE amount of ghosting in low light if we stay in HQ mode

Tried to lower noise reduction to -2?
Got rid of ghosting for me. Temporal noise reduction is causing the issue at higher levels.
Also lower sharpening to -2 when lower noise reduction to avoid noise.

FabioV Posted at 2022-12-1 08:57
The video you posted to YouTube is not an HDR video, then you cannot expect to see any difference between the two modes, because the videos are both flattened to a Rec 709 8 bits color space.
If you want to obtain a 10 bits HDR video from the D-Cinelike file, you need to import it in a video editing software as a REC 2020 color space (HLG or PQ) and then to do some color grading. When finished,  you can export it to a true HDR 10 bits mp4 video file. At that point you'll be able to appreciate the full dynamic range of a HDR video. On my YouTube channel ( https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzGivlymgBLFY1N_O087OGw ) I posted several videos taken with DJI drones (Mini 2 and Air 2s). When played with a HDR device (a smart TV, an iPhone or a MacBook for instance) the dynamic range  of the HDR video  is really different from the one of non-HDR.

Hello, I am new to this forum. Bought my dji mini pro 3, a month ago, but still I just cant get correct HDR export settings for adobe premiere pro. Whenever I upload to youtube, video is not in HDR.
My goal is to upload video in HLG to youtube so that it can be viewed on non HDR screens and also tru HDR screens.
Fabio, I seen your youtube video where you correctly uploaded HDR video, so I am very curious.

I need detailed and exact settings for
"color primaries" - (rec 709, P3D65, rec 2020) and
"export color space" - (rec 709, rec 2020, rec 2100 hlg, rec 2100 pq).
And also many other settings.
Can anyone help me?

I'm using Final Cut Pro, not Premiere. But in order to deliver a HLG file, you should set:
"color primaries" rec 2020 and
"export color space  rec 2100 hlg.
The codec should be HEVC (h265).
Then you can import the D-Cinelike file from your Mini 3 and post process it, performing manually the color grading or simply using some LUTs. Before uploading the file to YouTube, you must be sure it is a HDR HLG 10 bits file. Then you can upload it to YT as mp4 or mkv. If you perform some Google searches "Adobe Premiere D-Cinelike processing" you'll find a lot of tutorials. Be aware that YT will make available the HDR formats some hours after it finishes the 4K processing. And sometimes the HDR formats are not even delivered ...
I hope it helps.

FabioV Posted at 1-21 02:11
I'm using Final Cut Pro, not Premiere. But in order to deliver a HLG file, you should set:
"color primaries" rec 2020 and
"export color space  rec 2100 hlg.

Thank you. Definitely shortened my time experimetning. I noticed that HLG videos that ended up as hrd after some time, seem to be very dark on any screen except my lg oled that can display hdr.

And videos that are not in HDR seem like they are in hdr when watched on oled tv, even though there is no message of hdr popping up on the screen or in settings. Im startung to wonder if hdr is really needed.

Video thats not in hdr: https://youtu.be/Q4ABTNuvHgM

MikiDron Posted at 1-21 03:45
Thank you. Definitely shortened my time experimetning. I noticed that HLG videos that ended up as hrd after some time, seem to be very dark on any screen except my lg oled that can display hdr.

And videos that are not in HDR seem like they are in hdr when watched on oled tv, even though there is no message of hdr popping up on the screen or in settings. Im startung to wonder if hdr is really needed.

On HDR screens I can see a huge difference between HLG and 8 bits videos. If you look at videos on my YT channel, the HDR versions are brighter with a lot more contrast.

If I make a video for HDR, then it looks better on a normal monitor than if I do it in SDR.

HDR videos from my Air 2S need some color grading before being released. And they’re already HLG. I suppose D-Cinelike videos need even more.

MikiDron Posted at 1-21 03:45
Thank you. Definitely shortened my time experimetning. I noticed that HLG videos that ended up as hrd after some time, seem to be very dark on any screen except my lg oled that can display hdr.

And videos that are not in HDR seem like they are in hdr when watched on oled tv, even though there is no message of hdr popping up on the screen or in settings. Im startung to wonder if hdr is really needed.

Is really needed if you are in PRO works and client demands or you have a very high DR scenes.
Search the forum, you will find HDR indications.
Anyway, for editing HDR as a beginner you will need 2 monitors, one in HDR live and other normal.
The costs for such hardware setup is over 2000 USD as minimal, 4000 USD normal and 8000 USD high end.
I would say to try RESOLVE, edit a 5 seconds part, export it then watch it on HDR TV. You will see if need another corrections. At the end just copy settings from the small 5 sec to all clip.
HDR is not an easy work, but results are stunning.

Great comparison! Thanks