Recently I got the air 3 to get nice pictures/videos of my hikking and astrophoto trips. A week ago I was setting up my DSRL for making a timelapse of the landscape with the milkyway and it came to my mind the idea of testing the capabilities of the air 3 in terms of registering stars. After a lot of tweaking, I got a pretty decent shot where the milky way is visible (24mm, max exposure 8s, max ISO, 12mp sensor mode). Sadly, these settings are not available in pano mode, neither hyperlapse. Furthermore, I think much better results can be obtained if DJI enables longer exposures (10s at least). Anyways, I managed to manualy take a 3 tile vertical pano that I'm attaching here. The pictures were stiched and strechd using ICE and darktable.

I'm impressed that you were able to get that good of a photo with the drone, being an amateur astronomer myself.
Good job  

Real long exposure is 2s. The rest is the sum.

Awesome image.

Magnificent job on that 3 tile vertical pano.  

It would definitely be nice to have longer exposure available on the Air 3.  It's still a great drone but capable of doing so much more with some DJI firmware tweaking.  

Hello Dr Caos,  How did you tile those images?   Could you please share your process if you don't mind?  You said that you used ICE software.  Is that a Microsoft software? Do you have any recommendations for Mac?
Thank you,
Mustafa

Drone.Hunter Posted at 9-10 18:38
Real long exposure is 2s. The rest is the sum.

I don't think they are integrating anything in post processing, otherwise the output frame couldn't be catalogued as RAW

acayci Posted at 9-11 10:16
Hello Dr Caos,  How did you tile those images?   Could you please share your process if you don't mind?  You said that you used ICE software.  Is that a Microsoft software? Do you have any recommendations for Mac?
Thank you,
Mustafa

In this particular case I used Microsoft ICE, I'm still looking for a good alternative in MACos. So far none of the options is as good, but "panorama stitcher" does a decent job. Before stitching you have to correct vigneting of each tile in any photo editing software

Very nicely done!   I am very surprised that you were able to achieve that image.    I’m currently traveling in Australia with a Mini 4 Pro and may experiment with some Astro.  Thank you for posting.

Dr caos Posted at 9-11 16:41
I don't think they are integrating anything in post processing, otherwise the output frame couldn't be catalogued as RAW

This is official information. Manual v1.6, page 104

Drone.Hunter Posted at 9-11 18:35
This is official information. Manual v1.6, page 104

You right, I checked the manual with the "simulated long exposure". That explains the outstanding sharpness. Well, in that case I can try stacking some 2 sec exposures and see what I can get. Thanks for the info

What a shot!

Why a drone for such photos? There's much more suitable equipment, right?     

awesome photo, is such thing possible on the m4p?

frankymusik Posted at 9-15 01:12
Why a drone for such photos? There's much more suitable equipment, right?

I know, as I said I'm astrophotographer, this was just an experiment. On the other side, it is also true that you can have a very new aerial photo compositions that aren't posible with the standard equipment.

Nice shot! I’m dreaming about capturing aurora with a drone

I doubt a drone would be hovering still enough for those long exposures.