Just got my Mini 4 Pro 10 days ago and have been learning how to fly it. It's a lot of fun, but all my recorded video stutters terribly. Each of the recordings goes for 1 second, then a lull, then another second, then a lull, and so on, repeatedly.

I am using Cine mode and I have set all my settings according to many YouTube videos saying how to get the best smooth video. Recording in 4k 30. I am also being very smooth with the sticks.

I'm curious if I have a defective drone or is it something else. I'm recording to a SanDisk 128GB Extreme PRO microSD in the back of the drone. The video quality itself looks fine, it's just the constant 1 second stutter/jitter on everything I record. I pulled the SanDisk from the drone and uploaded the MP4 video directly to my laptop and played it using Media player. I've tried uploading to my home NAS too and tried playing it from my Hisense TV, same thing each way, terrible jitter every 1 second.
I also tried to upload the MP4 to Vegas Movie Studio 16 Platinum on my laptop and same result on playback.

I've uploaded to YouTube here also. https://youtu.be/UfFCb7vmgFc

Anything I can do to make this better? I will say that my laptop is older and when I am playing the video my CPU hits 100% for a long while.

OK WAIT, WAIT. I uploaded this video to YouTube, and YouTube did it's normal processing on the video, and when it was finished I went to my channel and viewed it, and it looked fine, with no stutter/jitter. I just don't want to have to upload videos to YouTube each time to see how they're going to look in the end.

Thanks for reading,
Bob

I've stopped recording in 4K because of how difficult it is to work with editing, uploading, transferring, etc...especially when you don't have a computer that's not up to specs.

Hi there. Sorry about the trouble. Can you try the procedures below?
1. Please try recording in H.264 video (1080P 30 fps). Then, play it to see if the issue persists.
2. Try using a different player. We recommend using Pure Codec, POTplayer, or KMPlayer on Windows or Movist Pro on Mac
3. It is also recommended to use a computer with higher configurations. or reduce the video recording resolution.
4. If the player prompts that the video is damaged, use another player. If the prompt appears again, it indicates that the video is damaged.
I hope this helps. Have a nice day.

Sounds like you recorded in H265 and you computer is not powerful enough to watch back h265 video.

DJI Tony Posted at 3-1 20:27
Hi there. Sorry about the trouble. Can you try the procedures below?
1. Please try recording in H.264 video (1080P 30 fps). Then, play it to see if the issue persists.
2. Try using a different player. We recommend using Pure Codec, POTplayer, or KMPlayer on Windows or Movist Pro on Mac

Thank you Tony, I'm going to give these suggestions a try.

DAFlys Posted at 3-2 01:25
Sounds like you recorded in H265 and you computer is not powerful enough to watch back h265 video.

Thank you for this, gonna try h.264

If you want to edit/work with 4k, if your editing software can use them then encoding into proxies is the way to go, here ya go, i found this for you, whilst ya, it takes longer to cause you have to encode proxy files, its certainly worth it if you want 4k...

Bashy Posted at 3-2 04:12
If you want to edit/work with 4k, if your editing software can use them then encoding into proxies is the way to go, here ya go, i found this for you, whilst ya, it takes longer to cause you have to encode proxy files, its certainly worth it if you want 4k...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i95pX2b3zOs&ab_channel=DoubtMeTech

Thank you, going to watch and try.

h.264 and especially h.265 were never meant for NLE editing. Those codecs are "delivery codecs". You need to transcode your footage to a uncompressed format such as ProRes for editing, and then re-encode to a delivery spec of h.264 or h.265 for your Y/T delivery.

There is a "ton" of info available online that will show you the workflow to use for just about any hardware scenario - good luck!

Gulfstream Posted at 3-2 12:33
h.264 and especially h.265 were never meant for NLE editing. Those codecs are "delivery codecs". You need to transcode your footage to a uncompressed format such as ProRes for editing, and then re-encode to a delivery spec of h.264 or h.265 for your Y/T delivery.

There is a "ton" of info available online that will show you the workflow to use for just about any hardware scenario - good luck!

Thanks for the message. I appreciate it. I was watching videos on h.264 vs h.265 today, although still a little fuzzy on the subject.

I should have mentioned in my original post, if I didn't, that I was taking the .mp4 video straight from the micro sd card and copying it to my desktop. Then, I was trying to play it using Media Player. That is when I saw the constant stuttering. I was not even trying to bring it into video editing software at that time yet.

The only time that the video looked fine is after I uploaded it to YouTube and then went to my channel to watch it after it had finished processing.

I guess just copying the .mp4 from sd card to desktop and then playing it does not solve the stuttering issue.
Meanwhile, if I pop the micro sd card into the RC controller and view it that way, the video looks really smooth.

I think I'll try bringing the video into my editing software and then trying to do an export to video format. I don't really know what will work at this point, but I'll keep trying.

I have the drone setup to record using h.265 at the moment. I'm using Vegas Movie Studio 16 Platinum. My eventual goal is to be able to get the video from the micro sd card to my computer and have it be a smooth video when playing it back, whatever that process is.

Thanks

djiuser_v7PwnRit8fBi Posted at 3-2 04:08
Thank you Tony, I'm going to give these suggestions a try.

You are always welcome. Please keep us posted if you need further assistance. Have a great day.

djiuser_v7PwnRit8fBi Posted at 3-2 04:09
Thank you for this, gonna try h.264

In h264 mode dont use any of the 10bit modes as these definitely will not play smoothly,   they often will just crash the viewer.  

Dirty Bird Posted at 3-2 14:02
I assume it stutters when you view it on your computer?  If you have the memory card inserted into the computer & the video stutters it is because your PC isn't up to handling processing 4K video in h.265 format.  

To eliminate the card as the problem, copy one one of the videos to the computer disk & attempt playback.  If the stuttering stops then try a higher quality Micro-SD card.

"EDIT - I see you already tried copying the files to your computer.  What are the specs of your computer?  Processor, memory, Windows version, how old is it, etc?"

Dell Inspiron 15r purchased 2012 (yeah, I know it's time)
Window 10 Home
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3612QM CPU @ 2.10GHz   2.10 GHz
8GB
Crucial BX300 240GB 2.5 inch SSD

Thanks

I did another test this afternoon where I recorded in h.264 (micro sd in drone), and afterwards I copied that video directly to my laptop desktop (sd card holder inserted in to laptop). Then I played the video that was on my desktop and I did not see the same 1 second constant stutter that I saw with h.265. Yes, a much larger file size but that was not really a concern.

This was my first post on the DJI Forum and I was impressed with all the replies with tips and suggestions to help me out and to help me learn. I've only had the mini 4 for about two weeks, and it's nice to know there is such a knowledgeable community at everyone's reach.

Thanks everyone.

My personal experience, SanDisk extreme pro 128 is slow for mini4 pro, it was perfect with my old mini 2 , but slow for the 4, I took Lexar silver x1066 128GB and the mini likes it

Hi, according to the description of the posts, the problem is not in the shooting and recording of the video, but in the playback of the video file on a computer.
And I can confirm that when I'm playing unedited 4K 10bit HLG 60fps video from M4P I get minor glitches even on a relatively good computer - i9 11900/128GB RAM/M.2 SSD nvme.

There are many tutorials on how to improve playback and editing quality e.g. in Davinci Resolve (I recommend this sw for editing) on weaker computers, just search on YT.

DJI M4P H264 and H265 video files should be the same size. According to DJI, their H265 encodings pack in more data than H264 and are therefore better quality videos. (They should give us the option to produce smaller H265 files at the same quality as H264 but they haven't.)

I'm really sorry to hear about your frustrating experience with the recorded video from your Mini 4 Pro. It sounds like you've put in a lot of effort to troubleshoot the issue, adjusting settings and trying different playback methods, but the stutter persists. It's possible that there might be a problem with either the drone itself or the microSD card you're using. Have you considered reaching out to customer support for assistance i recommend you can Visit site: castlemod.com/castle-for-tv/