Very informative post - good work!

Thank you for posting this up Diablo!

Although I'm finding on my M2P, aperture settings of f/2.8-4 are producing pronounced softness on the entire left third of my image, and it only gets corrected when I stop down to f/5.3 to 8, which gives me best clarity, uniformly across my entire frame.

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-23 10:25
Thanks, it is a pity I had to downsample the sizes so much...

Lots of detail though - thanks for sharing your insight

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-23 10:30
Hi there, I read other posts with misalignment issues... fortunately mine seems quite homogeneous. I would return the drone if I was you, the same happened in the past with the original MP (right corner). Sorry for that
ps. f/8 is quite blurry overall, almost as f/11, perhaps that what you are seing as "uniform", blurry all over the frame.

I want to go do some more testing, to make sure if I need to send it back, but the weather out here is just not cooperating



So with your M2P, at f/2.8-3.5, your image is totally sharp across the entire frame?

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-23 11:18
It is very close all over, obviously the bigger sensor (compared to the 1/2.3 of the MP) produces a more natural depth of field, things in the distance have a slight blur similar to what our eyes can see, it is not over sharpened artificially. Of course, extreme corners have some kind of fall-off, it is absolutely normal. Overall I am quite happy with the image it produces. It also improves vastly adding +1 Sharpness like on the original Mavic.

F/4 is best. F/2.8 and f/5.6 are close enough. I don’t care if it is not as sharp as the P4P, 90% as sharp is enough and it is portable  After all, sharpness is not everything...

Well, to be fair, my testing has been done in cloudy weather, and the time per test has been short because of clouds coming in waves with payloads of heavy rain, so haven't had the chance to conduct a real good test... Plus my Fly More Kit got delayed, so only have one battery too!



Being a photographer, I know there isn't a lens on the planet that will be uniformly sharp edge-to-edge; I'm a pixel peeper myself, but understand this concept and aren't phased by slight sharpness falloff at the edges. I just hope I don't have to send my brand-new bird back and deal with the potential hell that is DJI support!

So far I've been able to get very acceptable results in the f/5.3-8 ranges, especially when using Alex4D's Unsharp Mask plugin with FCPX, so can't complain there, but for $2k CAD, I wanted this thing to actually WORK 100%, so far it's sitting around 85% on my scale overall; flight-wise it's 100%, and am so happy when I fly this thing!

Are you refocusing after going to f11?

Yes I confirm the results. I made a similar test view weeks ago and the best result is f4. (f4,5 too) at 100 iso.

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-23 11:54
Tried both approaches, no difference whatsoever. With a 1” sensor depth of field is quite narrow regardless the aperture. The only issue making f/8 & f/11 softer is diffraction. Those apertures are still useable if sharpened in post but ideally wider apertures and an ND filter will give the best image quality.

I am not sure what you mean by "narrow" depth of field.  Most photographers use the terms shallow or deep to describe depth of field.

I find the M2P to fave a deep depth of field.  Thing close and far are usually in focus unless stopped way down and trying to focus at under 10 feet.

parkgt214 Posted at 2018-9-23 15:07
I am not sure what you mean by "narrow" depth of field.  Most photographers use the terms shallow or deep to describe depth of field.

I find the M2P to fave a deep depth of field.  Thing close and far are usually in focus unless stopped way down and trying to focus at under 10 feet.

Yep, this. And my upper f stops don’t look this bad. There’s a difference, but marginal. I specifically tested this inside and outside after the Y’allTube videos.

Would you please take a look in the below and let me know if you see any issues ? It's taken at f4.

Great, so which aperture is the sweetspot on this one, iyo?

Here are some originals at a google drive.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1NSJHatPvReImOXybYR3buyKzhEO5uX2b
I somehow fee confused. I can see some softness on the overall image, and wondering if others have the same result.
Thanks to anybody for taking the time to comment.

I'd say that f5 would be best. I was getting extreme soft corners and OOF issues when shooting at f2.8, and as soon as I  go to f5 that is gone. Also some of this "image soft" and corner issues might be caused by the autofocus mechanic. What I do is that every time I take off, I would manually focus when the drone is close to me so I know the focus is good, then just leave the focus bar untouched during flight.

Im hoping to have similar results to yours on my replacement thats on the way right now...
The one that was sent back was not even close to those.

A very interesting comparison with convincing results, thank you for that!

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-23 22:40
Are you using a 4/5K monitor to check this? The differences are very, very big at smaller apertures.

I’d need to redo my tests like yours, but yes. iMac 5k and also a high-end Dolby Vision 65” 4K TV.

To see 4K native on the iMac 5k, you’ve got to download a screen res changer. The native resolution is 2560 x 1440 (high DPI) if you didn’t already know. That’s why I prefer the TV to get the most accurate and it is color tuned.

Alas, I’m a pixel peeper, as well. I like perfection

Nicely done - thanks for sharing.

CineView Media Posted at 2018-9-24 05:23
Great, so which aperture is the sweetspot on this one, iyo?

Yep f4. After seeing El Diablo’s results, I concur. I ran a test flight for 10 minutes of footage in Aperture Priority mode @ f/4. It is indeed the sharpest. Auto mode seems to like f/9 and up in harsh light (like noon time).

I suspect that may have also led to some soft shots on YouTube videos we’ve all seen (high f-stops). Also LOG is just soft and needs improvement. Mavic Pro was like this at release also. Now LOG on it is much better.

Great investigation!  The artifact is very familiar - it's most def hitting the diffraction limit vs aperture sharpness.   What's surprising is that this is happening after ~f/4ish.  On 'real' cameras/glass with similar sized sensors I've seen this effect happening after ~f/11.   Anyone have an idea why its hitting this so much sooner?   Anyhow, glad I ordered those ND filters/CPLs  

Thanks El Diablo: my question is for those non professionals that might shoot in auto mode.  I noticed that the F-Stop in auto mode is actually 2.8.  Is this a desireable F-stop for full auto or will it change automatically with changing conditions?  I cannot test it right now due to current weather conditions, but my general knowledge is that the F-Stop cannot be changed in auto mode.  Is this correct?

El Diablo Posted at 2018-9-24 11:39
The easiest way to shoot if you don’t feel comfortable with Manual mode is to shoot in Aperture Priority (A), that way, you can choose the desired aperture and the drone will adapt accordingly the shutter speed. In any case, f/2.8 is quite sharp anyway

Ps. You can still change the aperture in Auto Mode, just use the scrolling wheel on the right of the remote!

Many thanks and thanks for your work on this!